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"I will be positioned in the same position by 2027," the Prime Minister stated, noting that if the discussion went well, he might invite the interviewer into Downing Street for a follow-up chat in 2026.

For a PM, there's never any downtime for leaders. Shortly before our chat started, Starmer had been in calls with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and attempting to understand exactly what had occurred in Venezuela, where his close ally, US President Donald Trump, had recently launched a strike against and detained its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

Once our lengthy talk, which was much longer than usual, had concluded, Maduro had been formally accused in New York.

Renewed Energy for the New Year

But as the year starts, Starmer seems to have had a kind of a refresh. Perhaps even just some a rest with the family at Chequers, the prime minister's rural getaway.

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

Yet, are he and his supporters being unrealistic if they reckon his standing are set to improve?

Leadership Questions

The grisly reality for the prime minister is that a significant number of his colleagues believe he's ineffective at his job. A faction of them would sooner gamble and oust him sooner rather than later.

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

Multiple times he insisted he'd be "assessed at the next election", insisting nobody would strip his five-year mandate from him – even if the most effective strategy of preventing Nigel Farage and Reform UK getting to No 10 could be for Labour to replace leader.

"We are in the battle of our times and I plan to be at the forefront," he declared.

The Spring Test

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

Accurate – to some extent. But even though he may be reluctant to admit it, No 10 will be evaluated by those elections too.

Despite this, Sir Keir implying that there were no scenario under which he would resign, even if a his colleagues ran against him for the job, should those elections be disastrous for Labour.

Promises of Improvement

He sought to account for his low poll ratings by saying the electorate was understandably anxious for things to change. He sought to convince me, and the nation, that this year would be different.

The economic situation would recover notwithstanding rising unemployment, he claimed, when policies the administration enacted during their first choppy year began to take effect.

• He committed to close asylum hotels before the current deadline of 2029, but he wouldn't set a new date on that.
• He said too, with the qualification that it was not a foregone conclusion, that a peace agreement in Ukraine felt closer now than at any time since Russia's comprehensive invasion.
• He disclosed for the first time that Western partners were now talking about how to coordinate US and European forces to offer security for Ukraine – to guard a potential peace.

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

Political Challenges

The PM may have spoken with greater vigour than I've seen from him for a some time – less tense, perhaps, with more time to talk.

But despite encountering calls from various quarters for a more decisive strategy, with increased political clarity, more dynamism, more pace and more urgency, his explanations were familiar ones.

When he finds himself in considerable political peril, is a different approach required a different script?

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

Sir Keir's problems are not only because governing is hard, but because he and his colleagues have erred, even in the recent past.

Regrets and Risks

The PM told me that he regretted saying he was "delighted" to see the return of the Egyptian-British activist Alaa Abd El Fattah to the UK after an backlash when comments he'd previously made – such as calls for Zionists and police to be killed – came to light.

Sir Keir attributed it to "the process" for not catching what the activist had said before – a fancier way of saying it wasn't his responsibility.

And he is inviting obvious political perils as the year progresses. His close relationship with the US president acquires a new complication after Trump's intervention on Venezuela.

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

Policy Stances and Pressures

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

Opponents demanded denounce it before the interview. And the administration is likely to face more pressure to give an definitive view in Parliament in the coming days.

There has also always been simmering pressure in the Labour ranks to reverse or renegotiate some of the consequences of Brexit.

The PM rejects he's heading in that direction, but his new specific plan to integrate further with the single market – the vast economic European trading zone – will probably trigger howls that he is breaking his pledge never to try to overturn the results that followed Brexit.

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