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"I will be positioned in this seat by 2027," the Prime Minister declared, adding that if our conversation went well, he might invite us into his official residence for another talk in the coming year.

For a PM, there's rarely ever downtime for prime ministers. Shortly before our chat started, the PM had been on the phone with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and trying to work out exactly what had transpired in Venezuela, where his close friend, US President Donald Trump, had just attacked and captured its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

By the time our interview, which was far more extended than usual, had ended, Maduro had been formally accused in New York.

A Reboot for the New Year

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

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

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

Internal Doubts

The harsh reality for the leader is that numerous of his colleagues think he's ineffective at his job. Several of them would sooner take a risk and get him out sooner rather than later.

However Sir Keir was dismissing such talk in the interview on Saturday morning.

Multiple times he stated he'd be "judged at the next election", arguing no one would take his electoral mandate from him – despite the fact that the optimal path of stopping Nigel Farage and Reform UK reaching No 10 may be for Labour to switch its leader.

"We are in the battle of our generation and I aim to guide the party," he declared.

Upcoming Local Votes

The issue for the prime minister is that he will be scrutinised long before then – in a mega set of elections in May throughout the UK. He sought to contend, maybe too much, that they are concerning who runs councils, 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 concede it, No 10 will be evaluated by those elections too.

This did not stop Sir Keir suggesting that there were no situation under which he would walk away, should one of his MPs contested his leadership for the job, if those elections be disastrous for Labour.

Predicting a Turnaround

He sought to rationalise his low poll ratings by saying the electorate was naturally impatient for things to get better. He tried to convince the interviewer, and the nation, that this year would be a change.

The economic situation would improve notwithstanding rising unemployment, he argued, when policies the government enacted during their initial turbulent year began to bear fruit.

• He vowed to shut asylum hotels ahead of the current deadline of 2029, but he did not set a new date on that.
• He noted too, with the caveat that it wasn't a foregone conclusion, that a settlement in Ukraine felt closer now than at any time since Russia's full-scale invasion.
• He revealed for the first occasion that Western allies were now considering how to combine US and European forces to provide security for Ukraine – to protect a potential peace.

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

Political Challenges

The prime minister may have communicated with renewed vitality than observed from him for a while – more relaxed, maybe, with a longer slot to talk.

However, in spite of encountering calls from many directions for a bolder approach, with much more political vision, more dynamism, more pace and more immediacy, his explanations were repeated ones.

When he finds himself in considerable political trouble, does he need a new narrative?

No government, and especially not one that has been unpopular for many months, has everything its as planned.

The Prime Minister's problems are not only because government is challenging, but because he and his colleagues have faltered, even in the recent past.

Regrets and Risks

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

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

And he is facing obvious political risks as the year progresses. His close relationship with the US president entails a new jeopardy after Trump's military action on Venezuela.

Having interviewed Sir Keir Starmer, a former human rights lawyer who opposed the war in Iraq, over many years, the thought he would be at ease with this kind of intervention seems implausible.

Policy Stances and Pressures

He asserted he was a "longtime advocate of international law" but the public "simply haven't got the full picture at the moment".

Some called for him to criticise the action before we spoke. And the government is likely to face more pressure to give an definitive view in Parliament in the near future.

There has also always been simmering pressure in the Labour ranks to reverse or renegotiate some of the outcomes of Brexit.

The PM denies he's pursuing that, but his new specific pledge to integrate further with the European trading bloc – the vast economic European market – will probably provoke howls that he is going back on his pledge never to try to reverse the decisions that followed Brexit.

A commitment to integrate into more of the single market will please a faction on his backbenches, but it is easy fodder for Reform and the Conservatives to