A Number of within the Labour Party Desire Keir Starmer Gone. The Prime Minister Informs Interviewers He'll Remain – and the Economic Outlook Is Set to Get Better.

"I'll be positioned in the same office by 2027," Starmer remarked, joking that if the interview was successful, he might welcome the interviewer into his official residence for a follow-up talk in the coming year.

There is rarely ever time off for those in the top job. In the hour before the interview began, the PM had been speaking with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and attempting to understand exactly what had transpired in Venezuela, where his close political chum, US President Donald Trump, had recently attacked and captured its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

Once our interview, which was much longer than normal, had ended, Maduro had been indicted in New York.

A Refresh for the New Year

With the year starts, Starmer appears to have had something of a refresh. Maybe even just a little a rest with his family at Chequers, the prime minister's country retreat.

This appeared to have left him in better spirits than at the difficult end of 2025, a awful annus horribilis for him.

But are he and his colleagues kidding themselves if they think his political fate are about to turn around?

Internal Doubts

The harsh reality for the PM is that a significant number of his fellow MPs believe he's ineffective at his job. Several of them would sooner take a risk and remove him this year.

However Starmer was rejecting the idea when we spoke on Saturday morning.

Multiple times he told me he'd be "judged at the general election", maintaining no one would strip his five-year mandate from him – even if the best chance of preventing Nigel Farage and Reform UK entering No 10 could be for Labour to switch its leader.

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

The May Elections

The challenge for the PM is that he will be assessed far sooner than then – in a mega set of elections in May across the UK. He tried to protest, perhaps excessively, that they are about who runs local authorities, and who runs the devolved administrations in Holyrood or Cardiff – and not a verdict on Westminster.

True – to some extent. But even though he may be reluctant 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, should one of his MPs challenged him for the job, should those elections be disastrous for Labour.

Promises of Improvement

He tried to explain his low poll ratings by saying the public was understandably anxious for things to change. He sought to convince me, and the public, that the coming months would be different.

The economic situation would recover despite rising unemployment, he argued, when policies the administration implemented during their initial choppy year began to bear fruit.

• He committed to empty asylum hotels before the current deadline of 2029, but he wouldn't set a new date on that.
• He said too, with the proviso that it wasn't a foregone conclusion, that a peace agreement in Ukraine felt closer now than at any point since Russia's comprehensive invasion.
• He disclosed for the first time that Western allies were now discussing how to coordinate US and European forces to ensure security for Ukraine – to protect a possible peace.

His big point is that soon the country will "see an improvement".

Familiar Arguments

The PM may have spoken with more energy than I've seen from him for a some time – calmer, perhaps, with a longer slot to talk.

But despite facing demands from within his own party for a bolder strategy, with increased political vision, more dynamism, more pace and more immediacy, his arguments were repeated ones.

Given that he is in such significant political difficulty, does he need a new narrative?

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

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

Controversies and Dangers

The prime minister admitted that he regretted saying he was "happy" to welcome back 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 – came to light.

Starmer blamed "the system" for failing to identify what the activist had said before – a more diplomatic way of saying it wasn't his responsibility.

And he is courting evident political perils as the year unfolds. His alliance with the US president acquires a new jeopardy after Trump's strikes on Venezuela.

Based on years of interviewing Sir Keir Starmer, a former human rights lawyer who opposed the war in Iraq, over many years, the notion he would be comfortable with such action seems implausible.

Policy Stances and Pressures

He told me he was a "longtime champion of international law" but the public "just haven't got the entire story at the moment".

Critics demanded criticise the action prior to we spoke. And the administration is likely to face further scrutiny to give an clear view in Parliament in the near future.

And there has consistently been bubbling tension in the Labour ranks to revisit some of the outcomes of Brexit.

The PM denies he's doing that, but his new more concrete commitment to move closer with the EU's single market – the vast economic European market – will probably trigger howls that he is breaking his vow never to try to reverse the results that stemmed from Brexit.

A commitment to integrate into more of the single market will delight some on his side of the party, but it is simple material for Reform and the Conservatives to