🔗 Share this article

"I will remain in the same position by 2027," Starmer declared, noting that if the interview went well, he might welcome the interviewer into Downing Street for a follow-up chat next year.

For a PM, there's never truly time off for prime ministers. Just an hour before the interview began, Starmer had been in calls with Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky and trying to decipher what on earth had occurred in Venezuela, where his big political chum, US President Donald Trump, had just targeted and seized its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

By the time the discussion, which was far more extended than normal, had concluded, Maduro had been indicted in New York.

A Refresh for the New Year

With the new year begins, Starmer appears to have had a degree of a refresh. Maybe even just some relaxation with loved ones at Chequers, the prime minister's official country residence.

This appeared to have resulted in a more positive mood than at the difficult end of 2025, a dreadful political year for him.

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

Party Concerns

The grisly reality for the PM is that numerous of his fellow MPs are convinced he's not very good at his job. Some of them would sooner take a risk and remove him this year.

But Starmer was having none of it during our conversation on Saturday morning.

Multiple times he stated he'd be "judged at the next election", maintaining nobody would strip his five-year mandate from him – despite the fact that the most effective strategy of halting Nigel Farage and Reform UK getting to No 10 could be for Labour to change leader.

"This is the fight of our generation and I aim to lead us," he affirmed.

The Spring Test

The issue for the prime minister is that he will be judged well ahead of then – in a huge set of elections in May throughout the UK. He sought to contend, perhaps excessively, that they are concerning who runs local authorities, and who runs the devolved administrations in Holyrood or Cardiff – and not a verdict on Westminster.

Accurate – in part. But even though he may not want to acknowledge it, No 10 will be evaluated by those elections too.

This did not stop Sir Keir suggesting that there were no scenario under which he would step down, should one of his colleagues ran against him for the job, should those elections be disastrous for Labour.

An Optimistic Outlook

He sought to account for his low poll ratings by saying the public was naturally anxious for things to get better. He tried to convince the interviewer, and the public, that the coming months would be distinct.

The economy would improve despite rising unemployment, he claimed, when strategies the government implemented during their initial turbulent year began to bear fruit.

• He committed to empty asylum hotels ahead of the current target date of 2029, although he did not set a firm date on that.
• He added too, with the caveat that it wasn't a done deal, that a peace deal in Ukraine felt a greater possibility now than at any point since Russia's full-scale invasion.
• He disclosed for the first occasion that Western partners were now considering how to integrate US and European forces to offer security for Ukraine – to guard a possible peace.

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

A Consistent Script

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

However, in spite of encountering demands from many directions for a more decisive approach, with increased political vision, more dynamism, more pace and more urgency, his arguments were well-known ones.

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

No administration, and certainly not one that has been struggling in the polls for many months, has everything its own way.

The Prime Minister's problems are not just because governing is challenging, but because he and his team have erred, even 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 after an backlash when past remarks he'd previously made – including calls for Zionists and police to be killed – resurfaced.

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

And he is facing evident political perils as the year gets going. His alliance 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 opposed the war in Iraq, over his career, the thought he would be at ease with this kind of intervention seems implausible.

Policy Stances and Pressures

He asserted he was a "career-long champion of international law" but the public "simply do not have the entire story at the moment".

Opponents called for him to criticise the action before we spoke. And the government is expected to face further scrutiny to give an definitive view in Parliament in the coming days.

There has also long been bubbling pressure in the Labour ranks to undo or remake some of the outcomes of Brexit.

Sir Keir disputes he's doing that, but his new more concrete pledge to move closer with the single market – the vast economic European trading zone – will likely elicit accusations that he is breaking his pledge never to try to undo the decisions that flowed from Brexit.

A move to cosy up to more of the single market will delight some on his own side, but it is prime ammunition for Reform and the Conservatives to