🔗 Share this article

"I'll be positioned in this seat by 2027," the Prime Minister stated, adding that if the conversation proceeded smoothly, he might invite the interviewer into Number 10 for another talk in the coming year.

There is rarely ever time off for those in the top job. Shortly before our chat started, the PM had been speaking with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and trying to work out exactly what had occurred in Venezuela, where his key friend, US President Donald Trump, had recently launched a strike against and detained its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

By the time our interview, which was far more extended than typical, had ended, Maduro had been indicted in New York.

Renewed Energy for the New Year

But as the year starts, the Prime Minister seems to have had a kind of a refresh. Maybe even just some a rest with the family at Chequers, the prime minister's rural getaway.

This seemed to have left him in better spirits than at the sluggish conclusion of 2025, a awful year politically for him.

Yet, are he and his supporters deluding themselves if they believe his fortunes are set to get better?

Party Concerns

The uncomfortable reality for the prime minister is that a significant number of his fellow MPs believe he's ineffective at his job. Several of them would sooner gamble and oust him sooner rather than later.

But Sir Keir was dismissing such talk in the interview on Saturday morning.

On several occasions he stated he'd be "assessed at the general election", insisting no one would take his electoral mandate from him – even if the optimal path of stopping Nigel Farage and Reform UK entering No 10 may be for Labour to replace leader.

"We are in the struggle of our lifetime and I intend to lead us," he declared.

The May Elections

The problem for the prime minister is that he will be assessed long before then – in a huge set of elections in May across the UK. He attempted to argue, 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.

True – up to a point. But even though he may be reluctant to acknowledge it, No 10 will be evaluated by those elections too.

Despite this, Sir Keir implying that there were no situation under which he would step down, should one of his colleagues challenged him for the job, should those elections prove very poor for Labour.

Predicting a Turnaround

He attempted to explain his unpopularity by saying the electorate was understandably impatient for things to get better. He tried to persuade the interviewer, and the public, that 2026 would be distinct.

The economy would strengthen despite rising unemployment, he said, when policies the government put in place during their initial turbulent year began to bear fruit.

• He committed to close asylum hotels ahead of the current deadline of 2029, but he did not put a firm date on that.
• He said too, with the qualification that it wasn't a foregone conclusion, that a settlement in Ukraine felt closer now than at any time since Russia's comprehensive invasion.
• He stated for the first occasion that Western allies were now talking about how to integrate US and European forces to offer security for Ukraine – to protect a possible peace.

His big point is that this year the country will "reach a turning point".

A Consistent Script

The PM may have communicated with renewed vitality than I've seen from him for a while – less tense, maybe, with more time to talk.

However, in spite of facing calls from various quarters for a bolder strategy, with increased political vision, more dynamism, more pace and more urgency, his arguments were well-known ones.

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

No government, and certainly not one that has been struggling in the polls 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 made mistakes, including in the last few weeks.

Regrets and Risks

The PM told me that he was sorry for saying he was "pleased" to welcome back the Egyptian-British activist Alaa Abd El Fattah to the UK after an controversy when past remarks he'd made in the past – such as calls for Zionists and police to be killed – came to light.

Starmer blamed "the process" for failing to identify what the activist had said before – a more diplomatic way of saying not my fault.

And he is facing evident political perils as the year progresses. His alliance with the US president takes on a new risk after Trump's military action on Venezuela.

Having interviewed Sir Keir Starmer, a ex- human rights lawyer who opposed the war in Iraq, over many years, the notion he would be at ease with such action seems unlikely.

International Law and Brexit

He asserted he was a "lifelong advocate of international law" but we "simply haven't got the full picture at the moment".

Critics demanded criticise the action prior to the interview. And the administration is likely to face further scrutiny to give an clear view in Parliament in the near future.

And there has always been bubbling pressure in the Labour ranks to reverse or renegotiate some of the consequences of Brexit.

Sir Keir denies he's doing that, but his new firmer commitment to integrate further with the single market – the huge economic European trading zone – will likely provoke accusations that he is going back on his vow never to try to overturn the results that flowed from Brexit.

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