🔗 Share this article

"I'll be sitting in the same position by 2027," Sir Keir Starmer declared, noting that if our discussion was successful, he might welcome the interviewer into Number 10 for another conversation in 2026.

For a PM, there's never any downtime for those in the top job. In the hour before our chat started, Starmer had been on the phone with Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky and working to work out what on earth had happened in Venezuela, where his key friend, US President Donald Trump, had just launched a strike against and detained its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

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

Renewed Energy for the New Year

But as the year commences, the Prime Minister appears to have had something 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 resulted in a more positive mood than at the difficult tail end of 2025, a terrible annus horribilis for him.

Yet, are he and his colleagues deluding themselves if they reckon his political fate are about to improve?

Leadership Questions

The harsh reality for the PM is that many of his colleagues believe he's not very good at his job. Several of them would sooner gamble and remove him sooner rather than later.

However Sir Keir was dismissing such talk during our conversation on Saturday morning.

Repeatedly he insisted he'd be "evaluated at the next election", insisting no one would remove his term from him – even if the best chance of halting Nigel Farage and Reform UK reaching No 10 could be for Labour to change its leader.

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

The Spring Test

The challenge for the PM is that he will be scrutinised far sooner than then – in a mega set of elections in May across the UK. He tried to protest, maybe too much, that they are about who runs councils, and who runs the governments in Holyrood or Cardiff – and not a verdict on Westminster.

True – up to a point. But although he may be reluctant to acknowledge it, No 10 will be evaluated by those elections too.

Despite this, Sir Keir stating that there were no situation under which he would resign, should a his colleagues contested his leadership for the job, should those elections prove catastrophic for Labour.

An Optimistic Outlook

He sought to rationalise his unpopularity by saying the voters was naturally impatient for things to change. He sought to persuade the interviewer, and the public, that this year would be distinct.

The economic situation would strengthen despite rising unemployment, he claimed, when strategies the administration put in place during their initial choppy year began to show results.

• He committed to close asylum hotels ahead of the current deadline of 2029, although he did not set a new date on that.
• He added too, with the caveat that it wasn't a foregone conclusion, that a peace deal in Ukraine felt more likely now than at any time since Russia's major invasion.
• He stated for the first time that Western allies were now considering how to integrate US and European forces to provide security for Ukraine – to safeguard a possible peace.

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

Familiar Arguments

The PM may have spoken with greater vigour than observed from him for a while – calmer, maybe, with more time to talk.

But despite encountering demands from various quarters for a more decisive strategy, with increased political direction, more urgency, more pace and more urgency, his arguments were repeated ones.

Given that he is in considerable political trouble, does he need a different script?

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

The Prime Minister's problems are not just because governing is hard, but because he and his colleagues have made mistakes, even in the last few weeks.

Regrets and Risks

The PM admitted 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 – such as calls for Zionists and police to be killed – resurfaced.

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

And he is facing clear political risks as the year gets going. His friendship with the US president takes on a new complication after Trump's strikes on Venezuela.

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

Policy Stances and Pressures

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

Some demanded denounce it prior to we spoke. And the government is likely to face more pressure to give an definitive view in Parliament in the next few days.

There has also consistently been simmering desire in the Labour party to reverse or renegotiate some of the outcomes of Brexit.

Sir Keir disputes he's heading in that direction, but his new firmer plan to move closer with the EU's single market – the giant economic European market – will likely provoke howls that he is reneging on his pledge never to try to reverse the choices that followed Brexit.

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