Some in Labour Seek Starmer Removed. The Prime Minister Tells Me He'll Endure – while Britain's Economy Is Set to Get Better.

"I will remain in the same seat by 2027," the Prime Minister remarked, noting that if our conversation went well, he might welcome us into Downing Street for another chat next year.

There is never truly time off for those in the top job. In the hour before our chat started, the PM had been in calls with Ukraine's Volodymyr Zelensky and trying to work out what on earth had occurred in Venezuela, where his key ally, US President Donald Trump, had just attacked and captured its leader, Nicolás Maduro.

By the time the discussion, which was far more extended than typical, had concluded, Maduro had been charged in New York.

Renewed Energy for the New Year

But as the year starts, Starmer seems to have had a degree of a revitalisation. Perhaps even just some a rest with the family at Chequers, the prime minister's rural getaway.

This seemed to have resulted in a more positive mood than at the difficult conclusion of 2025, a dreadful year politically for him.

Yet, are he and his allies kidding themselves if they believe his fortunes are poised to get better?

Party Concerns

The uncomfortable truth for the leader is that numerous of his fellow MPs think he's ineffective at his job. Some of them would rather take a risk and remove him this year.

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

On several occasions he told me he'd be "evaluated at the general election", maintaining nobody would remove his electoral mandate from him – even if the best chance of halting Nigel Farage and Reform UK reaching No 10 may be for Labour to change its leader.

"We are in the struggle of our times and I aim to lead us," he said.

The May Elections

The challenge for the PM is that he will be scrutinised far sooner than then – in a mega set of elections in May across the UK. He sought to protest, maybe too much, that they are concerning who runs local authorities, and who runs the governments in Holyrood or Cardiff – and unrelated to Westminster.

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

Despite this, Sir Keir suggesting that there were no scenario under which he would walk away, even if a his colleagues ran against him for the job, if those elections prove very poor for Labour.

Promises of Improvement

He sought to rationalise his low poll ratings by saying the voters was reasonably impatient for things to change. He sought to convince the interviewer, and the public, that the coming months would be a change.

The economic situation would improve notwithstanding rising unemployment, he said, when policies the government enacted during their first choppy year began to take effect.

• He pledged to shut asylum hotels ahead of the current target date of 2029, but he wouldn't set a new date on that.
• He noted too, with the caveat that it was not a certainty, that a peace deal in Ukraine felt more likely now than at any point since Russia's major invasion.
• He revealed for the first time that Western partners were now discussing how to combine US and European forces to ensure security for Ukraine – to guard a potential peace.

His big point is that this year the country will "reach a turning point".

A Consistent Script

The PM may have spoken with more energy than observed from him for a some time – more relaxed, perhaps, with a longer slot to talk.

However, in spite of facing demands from many directions for a bolder strategy, with much more political direction, more vigour, more speed and more immediacy, his arguments were familiar ones.

When he finds himself in this much political trouble, should he consider a new narrative?

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

The Prime Minister's challenges are not only because governing is challenging, but because he and his team have made mistakes, even in the recent past.

Regrets and Risks

The PM told me that he regretted saying he was "delighted" to welcome back the Egyptian-British activist Alaa Abd El Fattah to the UK following an backlash when past remarks he'd previously made – including calls for Zionists and police to be killed – surfaced.

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

And he is inviting evident political perils as the year gets going. His friendship with the US president acquires a new jeopardy after Trump's strikes on Venezuela.

Having interviewed Sir Keir Starmer, a former human rights lawyer who was against the war in Iraq, over a long period, the idea he would be comfortable with such action seems implausible.

Policy Stances and Pressures

He stated he was a "longtime proponent of international law" but we "simply lack the full picture at the moment".

Critics demanded denounce it before the interview. And the administration is expected to face increased demands to give an clear view in Parliament in the near future.

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

The PM disputes he's heading in that direction, but his new more concrete plan to integrate further with the EU's single market – the giant economic European market – will probably provoke accusations that he is going back on his vow never to try to reverse the decisions that followed Brexit.

A decision to cosy up to 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