🔗 Share this article

"I will remain in the same office by 2027," Starmer declared, adding that if our conversation went well, he might welcome the interviewer into his official residence for a follow-up talk in 2026.

For a PM, there's never any break for leaders. Just an hour before our chat started, the PM had been in calls with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and working to decipher exactly what had transpired in Venezuela, where his big ally, US President Donald Trump, had recently attacked and captured its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

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

A Refresh for the New Year

With the new year begins, Starmer seems to have had something of a reboot. Perhaps even just a little a rest with the family at Chequers, the prime minister's country retreat.

That certainly appeared to have resulted in better spirits than at the saggy tail end of 2025, a awful annus horribilis for him.

Yet, are he and his colleagues being unrealistic if they reckon his political fate are set to improve?

Leadership Questions

The harsh reality for the prime minister is that many of his party members are convinced he's underperforming at his job. Some of them would rather gamble and oust him in 2026.

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

On several occasions he stated he'd be "evaluated at the next election", maintaining nobody would remove his five-year mandate from him – despite the fact that the most effective strategy of halting Nigel Farage and Reform UK reaching No 10 might be for Labour to switch leader.

"This is the fight of our times and I aim to be at the forefront," he declared.

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 across the UK. He tried to protest, perhaps excessively, that they are about who runs councils, and who runs the governments in Holyrood or Cardiff – and not a verdict on Westminster.

Accurate – to some extent. But even though he may not want to concede it, No 10 will be evaluated by those elections too.

Despite this, Sir Keir implying that there were no scenario under which he would step down, even if a his MPs challenged him for the job, if those elections be catastrophic for Labour.

Promises of Improvement

He attempted to account for his unpopularity by saying the voters was understandably anxious for things to change. He tried to convince me, and the public, that this year would be a change.

The economy would strengthen in the face of rising unemployment, he claimed, when plans the government put in place during their initial turbulent year began to take effect.

• He vowed to shut asylum hotels before the current deadline of 2029, although he did not put a firm date on that.
• He noted too, with the proviso that it wasn't a foregone conclusion, that a peace agreement in Ukraine felt a greater possibility now than at any point since Russia's full-scale invasion.
• He stated for the first time that Western partners were now considering how to coordinate US and European forces to ensure security for Ukraine – to safeguard a possible peace.

His big message is that in 2026 the country will "see an improvement".

Familiar Arguments

The PM may have spoken with more energy than observed from him for a while – more relaxed, maybe, with a longer slot to talk.

However, in spite of facing demands from many directions for a more decisive strategy, with much more political vision, more urgency, more speed and more immediacy, his explanations were well-known ones.

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

No administration, and certainly not one that has been struggling in the polls for an extended period, gets everything its as planned.

The Prime Minister's problems are not just because governing is hard, but because he and his team have erred, including in the last few weeks.

Controversies and Dangers

The PM admitted that he was sorry for saying he was "happy" 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 – surfaced.

Sir Keir blamed "procedures" for failing to identify what the activist had said before – a more diplomatic way of saying it wasn't his responsibility.

And he is facing evident political dangers as the year progresses. His close relationship with the US president acquires a new complication after Trump's military action on Venezuela.

Having interviewed Sir Keir Starmer, a ex- human rights lawyer who opposed the war in Iraq, over his career, the notion he would be content with such action seems far-fetched.

International Law and Brexit

He stated he was a "longtime proponent of international law" but the public "just haven't got the complete details at the moment".

Some called for him to condemn it prior to we spoke. And the administration is likely to face increased demands to give an clear view in Parliament in the coming days.

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

Sir Keir disputes he's pursuing that, but his new firmer plan to align more closely with the EU's single market – the vast economic European market – will likely elicit howls that he is going back on his promise never to try to undo the results that followed Brexit.

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