🔗 Share this article

"I will be positioned in the same position by 2027," the Prime Minister declared, adding that if our conversation went well, he might welcome the interviewer into his official residence for a follow-up chat in the coming year.

For a PM, there's never truly downtime for those in the top job. Just an hour before we sat down, Starmer had been on the phone with Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky and working to work out precisely had happened in Venezuela, where his key political chum, US President Donald Trump, had recently targeted and seized its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

Once our interview, which was far more extended than usual, had ended, Maduro had been formally accused in New York.

A Refresh for the New Year

With the new year begins, Sir Keir seems to have had a kind of a reboot. Perhaps even just a little relaxation with loved ones at Chequers, the prime minister's official country residence.

This seemed to have left him in improved morale than at the sluggish end of 2025, a dreadful annus horribilis for him.

But are he and his supporters kidding themselves if they believe his standing are set to get better?

Internal Doubts

The uncomfortable truth for the PM is that numerous of his fellow MPs think he's underperforming at his job. Several of them would sooner take a risk and get him out sooner rather than later.

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

On several occasions he insisted he'd be "evaluated at the next election", arguing nobody would remove his term from him – even if the optimal path of preventing Nigel Farage and Reform UK reaching No 10 might be for Labour to change leader.

"We are in the struggle of our lifetime and I aim to lead us," he affirmed.

The Spring Test

The problem for the PM is that he will be assessed well ahead of 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 devolved administrations in Holyrood or Cardiff – and not about Westminster.

True – up to a point. But although he may not want to acknowledge it, No 10 will be judged by those elections too.

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

An Optimistic Outlook

He sought to rationalise his low poll ratings by saying the public was naturally eager for things to change. He sought to convince me, and the nation, that the coming months would be a change.

The economy would strengthen despite rising unemployment, he claimed, when policies the administration enacted during their first choppy year began to bear fruit.

• He pledged to close asylum hotels ahead of the current target date of 2029, but he wouldn't put a specific date on that.
• He noted too, with the qualification that it wasn't a foregone conclusion, that a peace deal in Ukraine felt a greater possibility now than at any point since Russia's comprehensive invasion.
• He stated for the first time that Western allies were now discussing how to coordinate US and European forces to ensure security for Ukraine – to guard a possible peace.

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

Familiar Arguments

The prime minister may have communicated with more energy than I've seen from him for a while – less tense, perhaps, with a longer slot to talk.

However, in spite of facing calls from various quarters for a bolder strategy, with greater political direction, more urgency, more pace and more urgency, his points were familiar ones.

Given that he is in considerable political trouble, should he consider a change of tack?

No administration, and especially not one that has been unpopular for many months, gets everything its as desired.

The Prime Minister's problems are not only because government is challenging, but because he and his colleagues have made mistakes, including in the last few weeks.

Regrets and Risks

The prime minister admitted that he regretted saying he was "pleased" to welcome back the Egyptian-British activist Alaa Abd El Fattah to the UK following an outcry when comments he'd made in the past – such as calls for Zionists and police to be killed – came to light.

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

And he is courting evident political dangers as the year progresses. His friendship with the US president entails a new risk 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 many years, the thought he would be content with these events seems far-fetched.

International Law and Brexit

He stated he was a "lifelong champion of international law" but we "simply do not have the complete details at the moment".

Opponents demanded denounce it before the interview. And the administration is likely to face increased demands to give an explicit view in Parliament in the near future.

And there has always been growing desire in the Labour party to undo or remake some of the results of Brexit.

Sir Keir rejects he's pursuing that, but his new more concrete plan to integrate further with the EU's single market – the vast economic European trading zone – will likely elicit howls that he is going back on his promise never to try to reverse the results that flowed from Brexit.

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