Some in Labour Seek Keir Starmer Out. He Informs Interviewers He Will Survive – while Britain's Economy Will Get Better.

"I will be positioned in this seat by 2027," the Prime Minister declared, noting that if the interview proceeded smoothly, he might welcome the interviewer into Downing Street for a follow-up talk next year.

For a PM, there's never any time off for prime ministers. In the hour before we sat down, Sir Keir had been speaking with Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky and working to understand exactly what had transpired in Venezuela, where his key political chum, US President Donald Trump, had just attacked and captured its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

Once our interview, which was far more extended than normal, had ended, Maduro had been charged in New York.

A Reboot for the New Year

As the year starts, the Prime Minister seems to have had a degree of a reboot. Maybe even just some a rest with the family at Chequers, the prime minister's rural getaway.

That certainly appeared to have put him in a more positive mood than at the difficult end of 2025, a terrible annus horribilis for him.

Yet, are he and his supporters deluding themselves if they reckon his political fate are set to improve?

Internal Doubts

The uncomfortable reality for the prime minister is that numerous of his party members believe he's ineffective at his job. Some of them would rather gamble and oust him this year.

However Sir Keir was dismissing such talk when we spoke on Saturday morning.

On several occasions he told me he'd be "judged at the poll", arguing no one would remove his term from him – despite the fact that the best chance of preventing Nigel Farage and Reform UK entering No 10 may be for Labour to change leader.

"We are in the fight of our generation and I plan to lead us," he affirmed.

The Spring Test

The problem for the prime minister is that he will be scrutinised long before then – in a mega set of elections in May across the UK. He attempted to protest, maybe excessively, that they are concerning who runs local authorities, and who runs the devolved administrations in Holyrood or Cardiff – and unrelated to Westminster.

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

Despite this, Sir Keir implying that there were no circumstances under which he would step down, even if a his MPs contested his leadership for the job, should those elections be disastrous for Labour.

Promises of Improvement

He attempted to explain his unpopularity by saying the electorate was reasonably anxious for things to improve. He tried to persuade the interviewer, and the public, that the coming months would be a change.

The economy would improve in the face of rising unemployment, he argued, when strategies the government enacted during their first turbulent year began to bear fruit.

• He committed to shut asylum hotels before the current deadline of 2029, although he wouldn't set a firm date on that.
• He added too, with the caveat that it was not a certainty, that a peace deal in Ukraine felt a greater possibility now than at any time since Russia's comprehensive invasion.
• He stated for the first time that Western allies were now discussing how to combine US and European forces to ensure security for Ukraine – to safeguard a possible peace.

His core point is that in 2026 the country will "turn the corner".

Familiar Arguments

The PM may have spoken with renewed vitality than observed from him for a while – more relaxed, perhaps, with a longer slot to talk.

However, in spite of facing calls from within his own party for a more decisive approach, with greater political vision, more urgency, more speed and more immediacy, his arguments were well-known ones.

Given that he is in this much political difficulty, should he consider a new narrative?

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

Sir Keir's problems are not just because governing is hard, but because he and his team have faltered, even in the last few weeks.

Controversies and Dangers

The prime minister expressed regret that he was sorry for saying he was "delighted" to see the return of the Egyptian-British activist Alaa Abd El Fattah to the UK after an controversy when statements he'd made in the past – including calls for Zionists and police to be killed – surfaced.

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

And he is courting evident political risks as the year unfolds. His alliance with the US president entails a new jeopardy after Trump's intervention 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 such action seems implausible.

International Law and Brexit

He stated he was a "lifelong champion of international law" but we "simply lack the complete details at the moment".

Critics called for him to condemn it before we spoke. And the government is expected to face increased demands to give an clear view in Parliament in the near future.

And there has long been growing pressure in the Labour ranks to reverse or renegotiate some of the consequences of Brexit.

The PM denies he's doing that, but his new specific pledge to move closer with the single market – the vast economic European market – will likely trigger accusations that he is breaking his pledge never to try to overturn the choices that stemmed from Brexit.

A commitment to integrate into more of the single market will please a faction on his own side, but it is simple material for Reform and the Conservatives to