🔗 Share this article

"I will be positioned in the same seat by 2027," Starmer remarked, noting that if our interview went well, he might welcome us into Number 10 for another talk in 2026.

For a PM, there's never truly break for prime ministers. Just an hour before we sat down, Sir Keir had been on the phone with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and working to work out what on earth had occurred in Venezuela, where his big political chum, US President Donald Trump, had just launched a strike against and detained its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

When our interview, 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 new year begins, the Prime Minister seems to have had something of a reboot. Perhaps even just a little a rest with his family at Chequers, the prime minister's rural getaway.

That certainly seemed to have resulted in a more positive mood than at the difficult conclusion of 2025, a awful political year for him.

But are he and his allies deluding themselves if they reckon his political fate are set to turn around?

Party Concerns

The grisly truth for the prime minister is that a significant number of his party members think he's ineffective at his job. A faction of them would rather take a risk and oust him in 2026.

However Starmer was having none of it when we spoke on Saturday morning.

Multiple times he insisted he'd be "judged at the next election", maintaining no one would take his five-year mandate from him – even if the optimal path of halting Nigel Farage and Reform UK reaching No 10 may be for Labour to change leader.

"We are in the battle of our times and I plan to guide the party," he affirmed.

Upcoming Local Votes

The issue for the PM is that he will be judged far sooner than then – in a major set of elections in May across the UK. He attempted to contend, maybe too much, that they are concerning 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 not want to acknowledge it, No 10 will be held accountable by those elections too.

Despite this, Sir Keir implying that there were no scenario under which he would walk away, even if a his MPs challenged him for the job, should those elections prove very poor for Labour.

An Optimistic Outlook

He sought to rationalise his unpopularity by saying the electorate was naturally eager for things to get better. He tried to persuade me, and the nation, that 2026 would be distinct.

The economic situation would improve despite rising unemployment, he claimed, when policies the administration enacted during their initial rocky year began to show results.

• He pledged to empty asylum hotels before the current target date of 2029, but he did not put a firm date on that.
• He noted too, with the qualification that it was not a foregone conclusion, that a settlement 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 considering how to coordinate US and European forces to ensure security for Ukraine – to safeguard a potential peace.

His big argument is that soon the country will "reach a turning point".

A Consistent Script

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

But despite facing calls from many directions for a bolder approach, with increased political clarity, more dynamism, more speed and more urgency, his explanations were well-known ones.

Given that he is in such significant political peril, does he need a new narrative?

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

The Prime Minister's challenges are not only because governing is difficult, but because he and his colleagues have faltered, including in the recent past.

Controversies and Dangers

The prime minister expressed regret that he was sorry for saying he was "happy" to see the return of the Egyptian-British activist Alaa Abd El Fattah to the UK following an controversy when statements he'd previously made – including calls for Zionists and police to be killed – resurfaced.

Starmer blamed "procedures" for not catching what the activist had said before – a fancier way of saying not my fault.

And he is facing evident political risks as the year progresses. His friendship with the US president entails a new jeopardy after Trump's intervention on Venezuela.

Based on years of interviewing Sir Keir Starmer, a ex- human rights lawyer who was against the war in Iraq, over many years, the thought he would be content with this kind of intervention seems implausible.

International Law and Brexit

He asserted he was a "career-long champion of international law" but the public "just lack the full picture at the moment".

Opponents demanded criticise the action prior to the interview. And the government is expected to face increased demands to give an clear view in Parliament in the next few days.

And there has consistently been growing desire in the Labour ranks to undo or remake some of the consequences of Brexit.

Sir Keir disputes he's doing that, but his new firmer commitment to integrate further with the single market – the giant economic European trading zone – will likely provoke protests that he is breaking his pledge never to try to reverse the decisions that flowed from Brexit.

A decision to integrate into more of the single market will delight a faction on his side of the party, but it is simple material for Reform and the Conservatives to