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"I'll remain in the same office by 2027," the Prime Minister declared, noting that if the discussion was successful, he might invite us into Downing Street for a follow-up talk next year.

For a PM, there's never truly break for leaders. Just an hour before we sat down, Sir Keir had been on the phone with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and working to decipher precisely had happened in Venezuela, where his key political chum, US President Donald Trump, had just attacked and captured its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

When the discussion, which was considerably lengthier than typical, had finished, Maduro had been indicted in New York.

A Refresh for the New Year

As the year starts, Starmer appears to have had a kind of a revitalisation. Perhaps even just a little a rest with loved ones at Chequers, the prime minister's rural getaway.

This appeared to have put him in improved morale than at the saggy conclusion of 2025, a awful year politically for him.

But are he and his colleagues kidding themselves if they believe his standing are set to improve?

Party Concerns

The grisly truth for the leader is that many of his colleagues think he's ineffective at his job. Some of them would sooner gamble and oust him sooner rather than later.

However Sir Keir was having none of it in the interview on Saturday morning.

On several occasions he told me he'd be "judged at the general election", maintaining no one would strip his electoral mandate from him – despite the fact that the best chance of preventing Nigel Farage and Reform UK entering No 10 might be for Labour to replace its leader.

"This is the fight of our times and I intend to lead us," he declared.

The Spring Test

The problem for the PM is that he will be assessed long before then – in a major set of elections in May throughout the UK. He sought to contend, perhaps excessively, that they are about who runs local authorities, and who runs the governments in Holyrood or Cardiff – and unrelated to Westminster.

Accurate – up to a point. But although he may be reluctant to admit it, No 10 will be held accountable by those elections too.

Despite this, Sir Keir implying that there were no situation under which he would walk away, should one of his MPs ran against him for the job, if those elections prove catastrophic for Labour.

Predicting a Turnaround

He attempted to rationalise his low poll ratings by saying the electorate was understandably impatient for things to change. He aimed to convince the interviewer, and the public, that 2026 would be distinct.

The economy would recover notwithstanding rising unemployment, he claimed, when strategies the government enacted during their first turbulent year began to show results.

• He pledged to shut asylum hotels ahead of the current target date of 2029, although he did not put a new date on that.
• He said too, with the qualification that it wasn't a done deal, that a peace agreement in Ukraine felt closer now than at any time since Russia's full-scale invasion.
• He disclosed for the first occasion that Western partners were now discussing how to coordinate US and European forces to ensure security for Ukraine – to safeguard a possible peace.

His core point is that in 2026 the country will "reach a turning point".

Familiar Arguments

The prime minister may have spoken with more energy than I've seen from him for a some time – calmer, maybe, with a longer slot to talk.

But despite facing demands from various quarters for a bolder strategy, with much more political vision, more dynamism, more speed and more immediacy, his explanations were repeated ones.

When he finds himself in such significant political trouble, is a different approach required a change of tack?

No administration, and especially not one that has been unpopular for an extended period, has everything its as desired.

Sir Keir's challenges are not just because governing is challenging, but because he and his colleagues have erred, including in the last few weeks.

Regrets and Risks

The prime minister admitted that he was sorry for saying he was "happy" to welcome back the Egyptian-British activist Alaa Abd El Fattah to the UK after an backlash when comments he'd made in the past – such as calls for Zionists and police to be killed – came to light.

Sir Keir attributed it to "the process" for not catching what the activist had said before – a more diplomatic way of saying not my fault.

And he is courting obvious political perils as the year unfolds. His friendship with the US president takes on a new complication after Trump's military action on Venezuela.

Based on years of interviewing Sir Keir Starmer, a ex- human rights lawyer who opposed the war in Iraq, over a long period, the idea he would be content with this kind of intervention seems implausible.

International Law and Brexit

He stated he was a "career-long proponent of international law" but the public "just lack the full picture at the moment".

Opponents called for him to condemn it prior to the interview. And the administration is likely to face increased demands to give an explicit view in Parliament in the next few days.

There has also always been growing pressure in the Labour ranks to revisit some of the outcomes of Brexit.

Sir Keir rejects he's doing that, but his new specific commitment to move closer with the EU's single market – the vast economic European trading zone – will likely trigger protests that he is reneging on his promise never to try to reverse the decisions that followed Brexit.

A commitment to align with more of the single market will please a faction on his backbenches, but it is simple material for Reform and the Conservatives to