Several in the Labour Party Desire Keir Starmer Out. He Informs Interviewers He'll Endure – and Britain's Economic Outlook Is Set to Improve.

"I'll remain in this seat by 2027," the Prime Minister declared, joking that if our discussion was successful, he might invite the interviewer into Downing Street for another conversation in 2026.

There is rarely ever downtime for leaders. In the hour before our chat started, Sir Keir had been speaking with Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky and attempting to decipher what on earth had happened in Venezuela, where his key ally, US President Donald Trump, had just attacked and captured its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

Once the discussion, which was considerably lengthier than normal, had ended, Maduro had been indicted in New York.

A Refresh for the New Year

With the new year begins, the Prime Minister appears to have had something of a reboot. Maybe even just a bit of a rest with his family at Chequers, the prime minister's official country residence.

That certainly seemed to have left him in improved morale than at the saggy tail end of 2025, a terrible annus horribilis for him.

Yet, are he and his colleagues kidding themselves if they believe his political fate are about to get better?

Internal Doubts

The harsh truth for the PM is that a significant number of his fellow MPs are convinced he's ineffective at his job. Some of them would rather take a risk and oust him sooner rather than later.

But Sir Keir was having none of it in the interview on Saturday morning.

On several occasions he told me he'd be "evaluated at the next election", maintaining nobody would take his electoral mandate from him – despite the fact that the most effective strategy of stopping Nigel Farage and Reform UK getting to No 10 might be for Labour to change leader.

"This is the battle of our times and I aim to lead us," he said.

The May Elections

The problem for the prime minister is that he will be judged far sooner than then – in a major set of elections in May throughout the UK. He attempted to protest, perhaps excessively, that they are concerning who runs councils, and who runs the governments in Holyrood or Cardiff – and not about Westminster.

True – in part. But although he may not want to admit it, No 10 will be judged by those elections too.

Despite this, Sir Keir stating that there were no circumstances under which he would step down, even if a his MPs ran against him for the job, if those elections prove catastrophic for Labour.

Promises of Improvement

He sought to rationalise his low poll ratings by saying the voters was naturally impatient for things to get better. He tried to convince me, and the nation, that the coming months would be different.

The economy would strengthen in the face of rising unemployment, he said, when policies the government put in place during their initial choppy year began to take effect.

• He pledged to empty asylum hotels before the current target date of 2029, but he wouldn't set a firm date on that.
• He noted too, with the proviso that it wasn't a done deal, that a peace agreement in Ukraine felt closer now than at any time since Russia's full-scale invasion.
• He disclosed for the first time that Western partners were now discussing how to combine US and European forces to provide security for Ukraine – to safeguard a potential peace.

His core argument is that this year the country will "turn the corner".

A Consistent Script

The PM may have spoken with greater vigour than I've seen from him for a some time – more relaxed, perhaps, with more time to talk.

But despite facing pressure from various quarters for a bolder approach, with greater political clarity, more urgency, more speed and more immediacy, his points were repeated ones.

When he finds himself in such significant political difficulty, should he consider a new narrative?

No administration, and certainly not one that has been unpopular for an extended period, has everything its as planned.

Sir Keir's challenges are not only because government is difficult, but because he and his colleagues have erred, including in the last few weeks.

Controversies and Dangers

The PM admitted 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 statements he'd previously made – including calls for Zionists and police to be killed – came to light.

Sir Keir blamed "the system" for failing to identify what the activist had said before – a more diplomatic way of saying not my fault.

And he is inviting obvious political perils as the year progresses. His friendship with the US president acquires a new risk after Trump's strikes on Venezuela.

Having interviewed Sir Keir Starmer, a former human rights lawyer who opposed the war in Iraq, over his career, the idea he would be comfortable with this kind of intervention seems implausible.

Policy Stances and Pressures

He asserted he was a "career-long proponent of international law" but the public "just lack the complete details at the moment".

Opponents wanted him to condemn it before we spoke. And the administration is likely to face increased demands to give an explicit view in Parliament in the next few days.

And there has long been growing desire in the Labour ranks to revisit some of the results of Brexit.

Sir Keir denies he's pursuing that, but his new firmer pledge to integrate further 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 stemmed from Brexit.

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