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"I'll be positioned in the same office by 2027," the Prime Minister declared, joking that if our interview proceeded smoothly, he might welcome the interviewer into Number 10 for another chat in 2026.

There is never truly downtime for prime ministers. Shortly before the interview began, the PM had been in calls with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and trying to work out precisely had transpired in Venezuela, where his close ally, US President Donald Trump, had just launched a strike against and detained its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

When our lengthy talk, which was far more extended than usual, had finished, Maduro had been formally accused in New York.

A Reboot for the New Year

But as the year starts, the Prime Minister seems to have had a kind of a revitalisation. Perhaps even just some a rest with loved ones at Chequers, the prime minister's rural getaway.

This seemed to have left him in better spirits than at the difficult conclusion of 2025, a awful year politically for him.

But are he and his supporters being unrealistic if they believe his political fate are poised to get better?

Party Concerns

The harsh truth for the PM is that numerous of his colleagues think he's ineffective at his job. A faction of them would sooner take a risk and remove him in 2026.

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

Multiple times he told me he'd be "evaluated at the general election", insisting no one would take his five-year mandate from him – despite the fact that the most effective strategy of stopping Nigel Farage and Reform UK getting to No 10 could be for Labour to replace leader.

"This is the fight of our times and I plan to be at the forefront," he said.

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 sought to protest, maybe excessively, that they are concerning who runs councils, and who runs the devolved administrations in Holyrood or Cardiff – and not about Westminster.

True – to some extent. But even though he may not want to acknowledge it, No 10 will be judged by those elections too.

Despite this, Sir Keir implying that there were no scenario under which he would walk away, should a his MPs contested his leadership for the job, should those elections be very poor for Labour.

An Optimistic Outlook

He sought to explain his low poll ratings by saying the voters was reasonably impatient for things to change. He tried to persuade the interviewer, and the public, that 2026 would be a change.

The economy would strengthen despite rising unemployment, he argued, when plans the government enacted during their first turbulent year began to take effect.

• He vowed to shut asylum hotels before the current deadline of 2029, although he wouldn't put a firm date on that.
• He added too, with the proviso that it wasn't a done deal, that a settlement in Ukraine felt a greater possibility now than at any point since Russia's major invasion.
• He revealed for the first occasion that Western allies were now discussing how to integrate US and European forces to provide security for Ukraine – to safeguard a potential peace.

His central point is that soon the country will "turn the corner".

Political Challenges

The PM may have communicated with renewed vitality than observed from him for a while – less tense, perhaps, with a longer slot to talk.

However, in spite of encountering demands from within his own party for a bolder approach, with increased political clarity, more vigour, more pace and more immediacy, his points were repeated ones.

Given that he is in this much political trouble, is a different approach required a change of tack?

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

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

Controversies and Dangers

The prime minister admitted that he was sorry for saying he was "happy" to welcome back the Egyptian-British activist Alaa Abd El Fattah to the UK after an backlash when past remarks he'd made in the past – including calls for Zionists and police to be killed – came to light.

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

And he is inviting obvious political dangers as the year gets going. His alliance with the US president entails a new jeopardy after Trump's strikes on Venezuela.

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

International Law and Brexit

He asserted he was a "lifelong advocate of international law" but the public "just lack the entire story at the moment".

Some demanded criticise the action before we spoke. And the administration is likely to face further scrutiny to give an clear view in Parliament in the near future.

There has also always been simmering pressure in the Labour party to revisit some of the outcomes of Brexit.

Sir Keir denies he's pursuing that, but his new firmer commitment to align more closely with the EU's single market – the giant economic European trading zone – will likely trigger howls that he is going back on his promise never to try to reverse the results that flowed from Brexit.

A commitment to align with more of the single market will please some on his backbenches, but it is prime ammunition for Reform and the Conservatives to