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"I'll be sitting in this seat by 2027," Sir Keir Starmer remarked, noting that if the discussion went well, he might invite us into Downing Street for a follow-up chat in the coming year.

For a PM, there's rarely ever downtime for prime ministers. In the hour before our chat started, Sir Keir had been on the phone with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and trying to work out what on earth had happened in Venezuela, where his key ally, US President Donald Trump, had recently attacked and captured its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

Once the discussion, which was far more extended than usual, had finished, Maduro had been indicted in New York.

A Reboot for the New Year

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

That certainly appeared to have left him in better spirits than at the saggy tail end of 2025, a dreadful political year for him.

Yet, are he and his colleagues being unrealistic if they believe his fortunes are about to get better?

Internal Doubts

The uncomfortable truth for the leader is that numerous of his party members think he's underperforming at his job. Some of them would rather take a risk and get him out sooner rather than later.

However Starmer was rejecting the idea when we spoke on Saturday morning.

Repeatedly he insisted he'd be "assessed at the poll", maintaining no one would remove his electoral mandate from him – despite the fact that the most effective strategy of preventing Nigel Farage and Reform UK getting to No 10 may be for Labour to replace leader.

"This is the struggle of our lifetime and I plan to guide the party," he declared.

The Spring Test

The issue for the prime minister is that he will be assessed long before then – in a major set of elections in May throughout the UK. He attempted to protest, maybe too much, that they are about who runs councils, and who runs the governments in Holyrood or Cardiff – and unrelated to Westminster.

True – to some extent. But even though he may not want to admit it, No 10 will be held accountable by those elections too.

This did not stop Sir Keir suggesting that there were no circumstances under which he would walk away, should one of his MPs ran against him for the job, if those elections be catastrophic for Labour.

An Optimistic Outlook

He attempted to account for his low poll ratings by saying the public was understandably anxious for things to improve. He sought to assure me, and the public, that 2026 would be distinct.

The economy would recover notwithstanding rising unemployment, he said, when strategies the administration put in place during their first choppy year began to bear fruit.

• He pledged to empty asylum hotels before the current target date of 2029, but he wouldn't put a specific date on that.
• He noted too, with the qualification that it was not a foregone conclusion, that a peace deal in Ukraine felt more likely now than at any point since Russia's major invasion.
• He revealed for the first time that Western allies were now considering how to combine US and European forces to ensure security for Ukraine – to safeguard a potential peace.

His big point is that this year the country will "see an improvement".

Political Challenges

The PM may have spoken with greater vigour than observed from him for a while – less tense, maybe, with more time to talk.

However, in spite of encountering demands from many directions for a more decisive approach, with greater political direction, more urgency, more speed and more immediacy, his explanations were repeated ones.

When he finds himself in considerable political difficulty, is a different approach required a new narrative?

No government, and certainly not one that has been unpopular for an extended period, has everything its own way.

The Prime Minister's challenges are not only because governing is hard, but because he and his colleagues have erred, including in the recent past.

Controversies and Dangers

The prime minister admitted 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 controversy when past remarks he'd made in the past – including calls for Zionists and police to be killed – came to light.

Sir Keir attributed it to "the system" for failing to identify what the activist had said before – a fancier way of saying not my fault.

And he is facing evident political dangers as the year gets going. His alliance with the US president entails a new complication after Trump's intervention on Venezuela.

Based on years of interviewing Sir Keir Starmer, a former human rights lawyer who was against the war in Iraq, over a long period, the idea he would be at ease with these events seems far-fetched.

Policy Stances and Pressures

He asserted he was a "longtime champion of international law" but we "just lack the full picture at the moment".

Critics wanted him to denounce it prior to we spoke. And the government is likely to face further scrutiny to give an clear view in Parliament in the next few days.

And there has consistently been simmering tension in the Labour ranks to reverse or renegotiate some of the consequences of Brexit.

The PM disputes he's pursuing that, but his new firmer pledge to move closer with the EU's single market – the huge economic European market – will probably provoke howls that he is going back on his vow never to try to overturn the results that stemmed from Brexit.

A commitment to cosy up to more of the single market will satisfy a faction on his own side, but it is prime ammunition for Reform and the Conservatives to