A Number of in Labour Want Starmer Removed. The Prime Minister Assures Me He Will Survive – while the Economic Outlook Is Set to Get Better.

"I'll be positioned in the same seat by 2027," Sir Keir Starmer stated, noting that if the discussion proceeded smoothly, he might welcome us into Number 10 for a follow-up conversation in 2026.

There is never truly downtime for those in the top job. Just an hour before we sat down, Sir Keir had been on the phone with Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky and working to understand exactly what had occurred in Venezuela, where his close political chum, US President Donald Trump, had just targeted and seized its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

When the discussion, which was considerably lengthier than normal, had finished, Maduro had been charged in New York.

Renewed Energy for the New Year

With the year commences, Starmer appears to have had something of a reboot. Perhaps even just a little downtime with loved ones at Chequers, the prime minister's official country residence.

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

But are he and his allies deluding themselves if they think his fortunes are poised to turn around?

Party Concerns

The uncomfortable reality for the prime minister is that numerous of his party members are convinced he's underperforming at his job. Some of them would sooner take a risk and remove him this year.

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

Multiple times he stated he'd be "assessed at the poll", insisting nobody would remove his five-year mandate from him – even if the best chance of stopping Nigel Farage and Reform UK entering No 10 might be for Labour to change leader.

"We are in the battle of our generation and I aim to be at the forefront," he said.

Upcoming Local Votes

The issue for the prime minister is that he will be assessed far sooner than then – in a major set of elections in May throughout the UK. He tried 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 – to some extent. But although he may not want to concede it, No 10 will be judged by those elections too.

This did not stop Sir Keir stating that there were no scenario under which he would walk away, should a his colleagues challenged him for the job, should those elections prove very poor for Labour.

Predicting a Turnaround

He sought to rationalise his low poll ratings by saying the public was understandably eager for things to improve. He tried to convince the interviewer, and the nation, that the coming months would be different.

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

• He vowed to shut asylum hotels before the current target date of 2029, but he wouldn't set a specific date on that.
• He added too, with the qualification that it was not a certainty, that a peace agreement in Ukraine felt a greater possibility now than at any time since Russia's full-scale invasion.
• He disclosed for the first time that Western partners were now talking about how to coordinate US and European forces to provide security for Ukraine – to protect a potential peace.

His central argument is that soon the country will "reach a turning point".

Familiar Arguments

The PM may have spoken with renewed vitality than observed from him for a some time – calmer, perhaps, with more time to talk.

However, in spite of encountering demands from various quarters for a more decisive strategy, with greater political vision, more vigour, more speed and more immediacy, his arguments were repeated ones.

When he finds himself in this much political trouble, does he need a change of tack?

No government, and especially not one that has been unpopular for an extended period, gets everything its as planned.

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

Controversies and Dangers

The prime minister told me that he was sorry for saying he was "happy" to welcome back the Egyptian-British activist Alaa Abd El Fattah to the UK after an outcry when past remarks he'd made in the past – such as calls for Zionists and police to be killed – surfaced.

Sir Keir attributed it to "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 obvious political dangers as the year progresses. His alliance with the US president takes on a new risk after Trump's strikes on Venezuela.

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

Policy Stances and Pressures

He told me he was a "longtime proponent of international law" but we "just lack the full picture at the moment".

Critics wanted him to condemn it prior to we spoke. And the administration is expected to face more pressure to give an definitive view in Parliament in the coming days.

And there has consistently been simmering desire in the Labour party to undo or remake some of the consequences of Brexit.

Sir Keir rejects he's pursuing that, but his new firmer pledge to move closer with the EU's single market – the vast economic European market – will likely provoke protests that he is breaking his promise never to try to overturn the results that stemmed from Brexit.

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