🔗 Share this article

"I will be sitting in the same position by 2027," Sir Keir Starmer stated, joking that if our conversation was successful, he might welcome us into Number 10 for a follow-up talk in the coming year.

There is never truly break for those in the top job. Just an hour before our chat started, Sir Keir had been in calls with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and trying to understand precisely had happened in Venezuela, where his close political chum, US President Donald Trump, had recently attacked and captured its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

When our lengthy talk, which was considerably lengthier than typical, had concluded, Maduro had been charged in New York.

A Reboot for the New Year

With the year commences, Starmer appears to have had a kind of a refresh. Perhaps even just a bit of downtime with the family at Chequers, the prime minister's country retreat.

That certainly appeared to have put him in better spirits than at the difficult end of 2025, a awful political year for him.

But are he and his colleagues deluding themselves if they think his political fate are poised to improve?

Leadership Questions

The uncomfortable truth for the leader is that a significant number of his colleagues think he's not very good at his job. A faction of them would sooner gamble and oust him in 2026.

However Starmer was rejecting the idea during our conversation on Saturday morning.

Repeatedly he told me he'd be "judged at the poll", maintaining no one would remove his term from him – even if the optimal path of stopping Nigel Farage and Reform UK reaching No 10 could be for Labour to change its leader.

"This is the battle of our generation and I intend to be at the forefront," he declared.

The Spring Test

The challenge for the prime minister is that he will be judged far sooner than then – in a huge set of elections in May across the UK. He tried to contend, perhaps too much, that they are about who runs local authorities, and who runs the devolved administrations in Holyrood or Cardiff – and unrelated to Westminster.

True – in part. But even though he may be reluctant to admit it, No 10 will be held accountable by those elections too.

Despite this, Sir Keir stating that there were no situation under which he would resign, should a his colleagues ran against him for the job, if those elections be very poor for Labour.

An Optimistic Outlook

He sought to explain his unpopularity by saying the public was naturally impatient for things to change. He sought to convince the interviewer, and the public, that the coming months would be a change.

The economy would strengthen despite rising unemployment, he argued, when policies the government implemented during their initial turbulent year began to bear fruit.

• He vowed to close asylum hotels ahead of the current target date of 2029, but he wouldn't put a new 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 comprehensive invasion.
• He revealed for the first time that Western allies were now talking about how to combine US and European forces to ensure security for Ukraine – to guard a potential peace.

His central argument is that in 2026 the country will "see an improvement".

Familiar Arguments

The PM may have spoken with more energy than observed from him for a some time – calmer, maybe, with a longer slot to talk.

But despite encountering demands from many directions for a bolder approach, with much more political direction, more urgency, more speed and more urgency, his explanations were repeated ones.

Given that he is in such significant political difficulty, is a different approach required a change of tack?

No administration, and especially not one that has been unpopular for an extended period, gets everything its own way.

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

Controversies and Dangers

The PM expressed regret that he was sorry for saying he was "pleased" to welcome back the Egyptian-British activist Alaa Abd El Fattah to the UK following an outcry when past remarks he'd previously made – such as calls for Zionists and police to be killed – came to light.

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

And he is courting clear political perils as the year gets going. His friendship with the US president takes on a new jeopardy after Trump's intervention on Venezuela.

Having interviewed Sir Keir Starmer, a former human rights lawyer who was against the war in Iraq, over a long period, the notion he would be content with such action seems unlikely.

Policy Stances and Pressures

He stated he was a "career-long champion of international law" but the public "just haven't got the entire story at the moment".

Some wanted him to condemn it prior to we spoke. And the government is likely to face increased demands to give an definitive view in Parliament in the near future.

And there has long been simmering pressure in the Labour party to undo or remake some of the results of Brexit.

The PM disputes he's pursuing that, but his new firmer commitment to move closer with the EU's single market – the giant economic European trading zone – will likely trigger protests that he is breaking his pledge never to try to overturn the results that flowed from Brexit.

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