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"I will be sitting in this office by 2027," Starmer remarked, joking that if our discussion went well, he might invite the interviewer into Downing Street for a follow-up talk in 2026.

There is never truly time off for leaders. Just an hour before the interview began, the PM had been on the phone with Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky and trying to understand precisely had happened in Venezuela, where his key political chum, US President Donald Trump, had recently attacked and captured its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

When our interview, which was considerably lengthier than typical, had ended, Maduro had been charged in New York.

Renewed Energy for the New Year

As the year starts, the Prime Minister seems to have had a kind of a refresh. Perhaps even just a little downtime with his family at Chequers, the prime minister's official country residence.

This seemed to have put him in better spirits than at the saggy end of 2025, a dreadful political year for him.

But are he and his supporters deluding themselves if they believe his fortunes are about to turn around?

Party Concerns

The uncomfortable truth for the prime minister is that numerous of his fellow MPs think he's underperforming at his job. Some of them would rather take a risk and get him out this year.

But Sir Keir was dismissing such talk when we spoke on Saturday morning.

On several occasions he told me he'd be "judged at the next election", arguing nobody would take his electoral mandate from him – despite the fact that the optimal path of stopping Nigel Farage and Reform UK getting to No 10 may be for Labour to change its leader.

"We are in the struggle of our generation and I intend to be at the forefront," he said.

The Spring Test

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

Accurate – in part. But although he may be reluctant to acknowledge it, No 10 will be judged by those elections too.

This did not stop Sir Keir stating that there were no scenario under which he would step down, even if a his MPs challenged him for the job, if those elections prove disastrous for Labour.

Promises of Improvement

He tried to explain his low poll ratings by saying the voters was understandably impatient for things to improve. He aimed to convince me, and the public, that this year would be different.

The economy would improve notwithstanding rising unemployment, he claimed, when plans the government implemented during their initial rocky year began to take effect.

• He pledged to empty asylum hotels before the current deadline of 2029, but he did not put a new date on that.
• He said too, with the proviso that it was not a certainty, that a peace deal in Ukraine felt a greater possibility now than at any time since Russia's full-scale invasion.
• He revealed for the first occasion that Western partners were now talking about how to combine US and European forces to ensure security for Ukraine – to safeguard a possible peace.

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

Political Challenges

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

But despite facing calls from many directions for a bolder strategy, with much more political direction, more urgency, more speed and more urgency, his points were well-known ones.

When he finds himself in considerable political peril, should he consider a change of tack?

No administration, and certainly not one that has been struggling in the polls for many months, gets everything its own way.

The Prime Minister's problems are not just because governing is difficult, but because he and his team have made mistakes, including in the recent past.

Controversies and Dangers

The PM admitted that he regretted saying he was "happy" to welcome back the Egyptian-British activist Alaa Abd El Fattah to the UK following an controversy when comments he'd made in the past – including calls for Zionists and police to be killed – resurfaced.

Sir Keir blamed "the system" for not realising what the activist had said before – a fancier way of saying not my fault.

And he is inviting obvious political perils as the year gets going. His friendship with the US president entails a new complication after Trump's intervention on Venezuela.

Having interviewed Sir Keir Starmer, a former human rights lawyer who opposed the war in Iraq, over many years, the notion he would be content with such action seems implausible.

International Law and Brexit

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

Critics wanted him to criticise the action prior to the interview. And the government is expected to face further scrutiny to give an definitive view in Parliament in the next few days.

And there has consistently been bubbling desire in the Labour ranks to reverse or renegotiate some of the results of Brexit.

The PM disputes he's heading in that direction, but his new specific commitment to integrate further with the single market – the vast economic European market – will likely trigger accusations that he is reneging on his vow never to try to undo the choices that followed Brexit.

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