Some in the Labour Party Want Starmer Gone. He Tells Interviewers He Will Remain – and Britain's Economy Will Get Better.

"I will remain in this seat by 2027," Sir Keir Starmer declared, noting that if our discussion proceeded smoothly, he might welcome us into Number 10 for a follow-up talk in 2026.

For a PM, there's never truly time off for prime ministers. In the hour before we sat down, Starmer had been on the phone with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and trying to work out exactly what had happened in Venezuela, where his close political chum, US President Donald Trump, had just attacked and captured its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

By the time our lengthy talk, which was considerably lengthier than normal, had concluded, Maduro had been charged in New York.

A Refresh for the New Year

But as the year commences, Starmer seems to have had a degree of a revitalisation. Maybe even just a little a rest with loved ones at Chequers, the prime minister's official country residence.

That certainly seemed to have put him in a more positive mood than at the difficult tail end of 2025, a terrible year politically for him.

Yet, are he and his supporters deluding themselves if they think his political fate are about to get better?

Internal Doubts

The harsh reality for the PM is that many of his fellow MPs are convinced he's ineffective at his job. A faction of them would rather gamble and oust him in 2026.

But Starmer was having none of it during our conversation on Saturday morning.

Repeatedly he insisted he'd be "evaluated at the general election", insisting no one would strip his electoral mandate from him – despite the fact that the optimal path of preventing Nigel Farage and Reform UK entering No 10 might be for Labour to switch its leader.

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

The May Elections

The issue for the PM is that he will be assessed long before then – in a huge set of elections in May throughout the UK. He tried to protest, maybe too much, that they are concerning who runs local authorities, and who runs the governments in Holyrood or Cardiff – and not about Westminster.

Accurate – to some extent. But although he may not want to acknowledge it, No 10 will be evaluated by those elections too.

This did not stop Sir Keir implying that there were no scenario under which he would step down, should one of his MPs ran against him for the job, should those elections prove very poor for Labour.

Promises of Improvement

He attempted to explain his unpopularity by saying the electorate was reasonably anxious for things to get better. He aimed to persuade me, and the nation, that this year would be different.

The economic situation would improve despite rising unemployment, he claimed, when strategies the government put in place during their initial choppy year began to take effect.

• He vowed to empty asylum hotels before the current target date of 2029, although he wouldn't set a new date on that.
• He said too, with the qualification that it was not a foregone conclusion, that a peace deal in Ukraine felt more likely now than at any point since Russia's major invasion.
• He disclosed for the first time that Western partners were now considering how to integrate US and European forces to offer security for Ukraine – to protect a potential peace.

His central argument is that in 2026 the country will "reach a turning point".

A Consistent Script

The prime minister may have spoken with renewed vitality than I've seen from him for a some time – more relaxed, perhaps, with more time to talk.

But despite encountering pressure from many directions for a more decisive strategy, with much more political clarity, more dynamism, more pace and more immediacy, his points were well-known ones.

When he finds himself in considerable political difficulty, is a different approach required a new narrative?

No administration, 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 colleagues have faltered, even in the recent past.

Regrets and Risks

The PM told me 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 made in the past – such as calls for Zionists and police to be killed – surfaced.

Sir Keir blamed "the system" for not realising what the activist had said before – a fancier way of saying it wasn't his responsibility.

And he is facing evident political risks as the year unfolds. His friendship with the US president entails a new complication after Trump's intervention on Venezuela.

Having interviewed Sir Keir Starmer, a ex- human rights lawyer who opposed the war in Iraq, over many years, the notion he would be at ease with these events seems unlikely.

International Law and Brexit

He told me he was a "career-long champion of international law" but we "simply do not have the entire story at the moment".

Some 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 coming days.

And there has always been growing desire in the Labour party to reverse or renegotiate some of the consequences of Brexit.

The PM denies he's heading in that direction, but his new firmer plan to integrate further with the European trading bloc – the huge economic European trading zone – will likely elicit accusations that he is reneging on his promise never to try to undo the results that stemmed from Brexit.

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