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"I will be sitting in the same seat by 2027," Sir Keir Starmer declared, adding that if the conversation proceeded smoothly, he might welcome the interviewer into Number 10 for a follow-up conversation next year.

For a PM, there's never truly break for leaders. Just an hour before we sat down, Starmer had been on the phone with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and trying to work out exactly what had occurred in Venezuela, where his close political chum, US President Donald Trump, had just launched a strike against and detained its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

By the time our lengthy talk, which was much longer than usual, had finished, Maduro had been indicted in New York.

Renewed Energy for the New Year

But as the year starts, Sir Keir seems to have had a kind of a revitalisation. Perhaps even just some a rest with loved ones at Chequers, the prime minister's country retreat.

This seemed to have resulted in a more positive mood than at the difficult conclusion of 2025, a dreadful political year for him.

Yet, are he and his allies being unrealistic if they believe his political fate are poised to turn around?

Party Concerns

The uncomfortable truth for the PM is that a significant number of his fellow MPs think he's not very good at his job. Some of them would sooner gamble and remove him in 2026.

However Sir Keir was rejecting the idea during our conversation on Saturday morning.

Multiple times he told me he'd be "assessed at the next election", arguing nobody would take his five-year mandate from him – even if the optimal path of halting Nigel Farage and Reform UK getting to No 10 may be for Labour to change its leader.

"This is the battle of our generation and I plan to be at the forefront," he affirmed.

The Spring Test

The challenge for the prime minister is that he will be judged far sooner than then – in a mega set of elections in May across the UK. He sought to protest, maybe too much, that they are concerning who runs local authorities, and who runs the devolved administrations in Holyrood or Cardiff – and not a verdict on Westminster.

Accurate – up to a point. But even though he may not want to admit it, No 10 will be evaluated by those elections too.

Despite this, Sir Keir suggesting that there were no circumstances under which he would walk away, should a his MPs contested his leadership for the job, if those elections prove very poor for Labour.

An Optimistic Outlook

He sought to rationalise his unpopularity by saying the electorate was naturally anxious for things to improve. He sought to convince me, and the public, that the coming months would be a change.

The economy would recover in the face of rising unemployment, he claimed, when plans the government put in place during their first choppy year began to show results.

• He pledged to close asylum hotels before the current target date of 2029, although he wouldn't put a specific date on that.
• He said too, with the qualification that it wasn't a foregone conclusion, that a peace deal in Ukraine felt more likely now than at any point since Russia's major invasion.
• He disclosed for the first occasion that Western partners were now talking about how to integrate US and European forces to ensure security for Ukraine – to safeguard a potential peace.

His core point is that in 2026 the country will "turn the corner".

Familiar Arguments

The prime minister may have communicated with renewed vitality than I've seen from him for a while – more relaxed, maybe, with a longer slot to talk.

But despite facing pressure from many directions for a more decisive strategy, with much more political direction, more dynamism, more pace and more immediacy, his explanations were well-known ones.

Given that he is in this much political trouble, should he consider a different script?

No administration, and certainly not one that has been unpopular for many months, gets everything its own way.

The Prime Minister's challenges are not only because government is difficult, but because he and his colleagues have faltered, including in the last few weeks.

Regrets and Risks

The prime minister told me that he was sorry for saying he was "pleased" to see the return of the Egyptian-British activist Alaa Abd El Fattah to the UK following an outcry when past remarks he'd previously made – including calls for Zionists and police to be killed – surfaced.

Starmer attributed it to "the process" for not catching what the activist had said before – a fancier way of saying not my fault.

And he is inviting clear political risks as the year progresses. His close relationship with the US president acquires a new complication after Trump's intervention on Venezuela.

Having interviewed Sir Keir Starmer, a ex- human rights lawyer who was against the war in Iraq, over many years, the notion he would be content with these events seems far-fetched.

International Law and Brexit

He told me he was a "career-long champion of international law" but we "just haven't got the full picture at the moment".

Opponents called for him to condemn it before the interview. And the administration is expected to face further scrutiny to give an explicit view in Parliament in the near future.

There has also consistently been bubbling desire in the Labour ranks to revisit some of the results of Brexit.

Sir Keir denies he's pursuing that, but his new more concrete commitment to integrate further with the single market – the vast economic European market – will probably provoke accusations that he is reneging on his promise never to try to overturn the decisions that stemmed from Brexit.

A decision to align with more of the single market will satisfy many on his side of the party, but it is easy fodder for Reform and the Conservatives to