🔗 Share this article

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

There is never any downtime for prime ministers. Shortly before our chat started, Sir Keir had been speaking with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and attempting to decipher what on earth had transpired in Venezuela, where his close friend, US President Donald Trump, had recently attacked and captured its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

By the time our interview, which was far more extended than normal, had concluded, Maduro had been formally accused in New York.

Renewed Energy for the New Year

But as the year commences, Starmer seems to have had a degree of a refresh. Maybe even just a little a rest with loved ones at Chequers, the prime minister's official country residence.

This seemed to have left him in better spirits than at the saggy conclusion of 2025, a awful annus horribilis for him.

But are he and his supporters deluding themselves if they reckon his fortunes are set to get better?

Internal Doubts

The harsh truth for the PM is that a significant number of his colleagues are convinced he's ineffective at his job. Some of them would sooner gamble and get him out sooner rather than later.

However Sir Keir was rejecting the idea in the interview on Saturday morning.

Repeatedly he told me he'd be "judged at the next election", arguing no one would take his electoral mandate from him – despite the fact that the best chance of stopping Nigel Farage and Reform UK entering No 10 might be for Labour to change its leader.

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

The Spring Test

The issue for the prime minister is that he will be assessed well ahead of then – in a mega set of elections in May across the UK. He attempted to protest, maybe too much, that they are about who runs councils, and who runs the devolved administrations in Holyrood or Cardiff – and unrelated to Westminster.

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

Despite this, Sir Keir stating that there were no circumstances under which he would step down, should a his colleagues ran against him for the job, should those elections be disastrous for Labour.

Promises of Improvement

He tried to account for his low poll ratings by saying the electorate was understandably impatient for things to improve. He aimed to persuade me, and the public, that the coming months would be a change.

The economy would recover despite rising unemployment, he claimed, when policies the government enacted during their initial rocky year began to bear fruit.

• He committed to empty asylum hotels before the current deadline of 2029, but he did not put a firm date on that.
• He noted too, with the caveat that it was not a certainty, that a peace deal in Ukraine felt more likely now than at any time since Russia's comprehensive invasion.
• He stated for the first time that Western allies were now talking about how to combine US and European forces to ensure security for Ukraine – to protect a possible peace.

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

A Consistent Script

The PM may have spoken with more energy than I've seen from him for a while – more relaxed, perhaps, with a longer slot to talk.

However, in spite of encountering calls from within his own party for a more decisive strategy, with increased political vision, more dynamism, more speed and more immediacy, his points were well-known ones.

Given that he is in such significant political peril, is a different approach required a different script?

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

Sir Keir's challenges are not only because government is challenging, but because he and his colleagues have made mistakes, including in the recent past.

Regrets and Risks

The PM admitted 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 outcry when past remarks he'd made in the past – such as calls for Zionists and police to be killed – came to light.

Sir Keir 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 courting evident political dangers as the year progresses. His alliance with the US president entails a new jeopardy after Trump's military action on Venezuela.

Having interviewed Sir Keir Starmer, a former human rights lawyer who was against the war in Iraq, over his career, the notion he would be at ease with this kind of intervention seems unlikely.

International Law and Brexit

He asserted he was a "lifelong proponent of international law" but we "just lack the entire story at the moment".

Some wanted him to criticise the action before the interview. And the administration is likely to face increased demands to give an definitive view in Parliament in the coming days.

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

Sir Keir disputes he's heading in that direction, but his new firmer pledge to align more closely with the EU's single market – the giant economic European trading zone – will likely trigger accusations that he is going back on his vow never to try to reverse the decisions that followed Brexit.

A commitment to cosy up to more of the single market will please many on his backbenches, but it is simple material for Reform and the Conservatives to