🔗 Share this article

"I will be positioned in this seat by 2027," Sir Keir Starmer stated, noting that if the conversation was successful, he might invite the interviewer into his official residence for another talk next year.

There is never any downtime for those in the top job. Just an hour before we sat down, Sir Keir had been in calls with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and attempting to work out precisely had transpired in Venezuela, where his close political chum, US President Donald Trump, had just attacked and captured its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

Once the discussion, which was far more extended than typical, had concluded, Maduro had been formally accused in New York.

Renewed Energy for the New Year

But as the year commences, the Prime Minister appears to have had something of a reboot. Maybe even just a little a rest with loved ones at Chequers, the prime minister's rural getaway.

That certainly seemed to have put him in a more positive mood than at the sluggish conclusion of 2025, a dreadful political year for him.

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

Party Concerns

The grisly truth for the leader is that numerous of his party members think he's underperforming at his job. Some of them would sooner gamble and remove him this year.

However Starmer was having none of it in the interview on Saturday morning.

Repeatedly he insisted he'd be "judged at the poll", arguing no one would remove his five-year mandate from him – even if the most effective strategy of halting Nigel Farage and Reform UK reaching No 10 could be for Labour to switch leader.

"We are in the battle of our lifetime and I aim to guide the party," he said.

Upcoming Local Votes

The problem for the prime minister 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 concerning who runs councils, and who runs the governments in Holyrood or Cardiff – and not a verdict on Westminster.

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

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

Promises of Improvement

He tried to explain his low poll ratings by saying the public was naturally impatient for things to change. He sought to convince me, and the nation, that the coming months would be different.

The economy would improve in the face of rising unemployment, he argued, when policies the government implemented during their initial turbulent year began to bear fruit.

• He pledged to empty asylum hotels ahead of the current target date of 2029, but he did not set a firm date on that.
• He said too, with the caveat that it wasn't a certainty, that a peace agreement in Ukraine felt a greater possibility now than at any point since Russia's major invasion.
• He stated for the first occasion that Western allies were now discussing how to integrate US and European forces to offer security for Ukraine – to safeguard a potential peace.

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

Familiar Arguments

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

But despite encountering calls from various quarters for a bolder approach, with increased political vision, more dynamism, more speed and more urgency, his explanations were well-known ones.

When he finds himself in such significant political difficulty, does he need a new narrative?

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 hard, but because he and his colleagues have faltered, even in the last few weeks.

Controversies and Dangers

The PM expressed regret that he was sorry for saying he was "delighted" to welcome back the Egyptian-British activist Alaa Abd El Fattah to the UK following an backlash when past remarks he'd previously made – including calls for Zionists and police to be killed – came to light.

Starmer attributed it to "the system" for not realising what the activist had said before – a fancier way of saying it wasn't his responsibility.

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

Having interviewed Sir Keir Starmer, a ex- human rights lawyer who opposed the war in Iraq, over his career, the idea he would be content with this kind of intervention seems implausible.

International Law and Brexit

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

Opponents called for him to criticise the action prior to the interview. And the administration is likely to face increased demands to give an explicit view in Parliament in the next few days.

And there has always been simmering desire in the Labour party to reverse or renegotiate some of the consequences of Brexit.

The PM rejects he's pursuing that, but his new more concrete pledge to align more closely with the European trading bloc – the vast economic European trading zone – will probably trigger accusations that he is reneging on his promise never to try to reverse the decisions that stemmed from Brexit.

A move to integrate into more of the single market will satisfy some on his own side, but it is prime ammunition for Reform and the Conservatives to