"I will be positioned in the same seat by 2027," Starmer stated, adding that if the discussion went well, he might welcome us into Number 10 for another conversation next year.
There is never truly downtime for those in the top job. Shortly before we sat down, the PM had been on the phone with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and trying to decipher what on earth had occurred in Venezuela, where his key political chum, US President Donald Trump, had just targeted and seized its leader, Nicolás Maduro.
Once the discussion, which was considerably lengthier than typical, had finished, Maduro had been indicted in New York.
But as the year starts, Starmer appears to have had something of a reboot. Perhaps even just a bit of relaxation with loved ones at Chequers, the prime minister's rural getaway.
This appeared to have resulted in improved morale than at the sluggish conclusion of 2025, a awful political year for him.
But are he and his colleagues being unrealistic if they think his standing are set to turn around?
The grisly reality for the PM is that many of his fellow MPs believe he's underperforming at his job. Some of them would sooner take a risk and remove him sooner rather than later.
However Starmer was rejecting the idea during our conversation on Saturday morning.
Repeatedly he insisted he'd be "assessed at the poll", maintaining no one would take his electoral mandate from him – despite the fact that the best chance of preventing Nigel Farage and Reform UK entering No 10 could be for Labour to replace its leader.
"This is the fight of our generation and I aim to be at the forefront," he declared.
The issue for the prime minister is that he will be assessed well ahead of then – in a mega set of elections in May throughout the UK. He tried to protest, maybe excessively, that they are about who runs councils, and who runs the governments in Holyrood or Cardiff – and unrelated to Westminster.
Accurate – to some extent. But even though he may not want to acknowledge it, No 10 will be evaluated by those elections too.
This did not stop Sir Keir suggesting that there were no scenario under which he would walk away, should one of his colleagues ran against him for the job, should those elections be very poor for Labour.
He attempted to rationalise his unpopularity by saying the voters was naturally anxious for things to improve. He tried to convince the interviewer, and the public, that this year would be different.
The economic situation would recover in the face of rising unemployment, he claimed, when policies the government enacted during their first rocky year began to bear fruit.
His big point is that this year the country will "see an improvement".
The PM may have spoken with more energy than observed from him for a some time – more relaxed, perhaps, with more time to talk.
However, in spite of facing pressure from various quarters for a bolder strategy, with much more political direction, more vigour, more speed and more immediacy, his points were repeated ones.
Given that he is in considerable political peril, is a different approach required a different script?
No government, and especially not one that has been struggling in the polls for many months, has everything its own way.
The Prime Minister's problems are not only because government is difficult, but because he and his colleagues have made mistakes, even in the last few weeks.
The PM expressed regret that he regretted saying he was "pleased" to welcome back the Egyptian-British activist Alaa Abd El Fattah to the UK following an controversy when comments he'd made in the past – including calls for Zionists and police to be killed – resurfaced.
Starmer attributed it to "the process" for not catching what the activist had said before – a more diplomatic way of saying not my fault.
And he is inviting clear political dangers as the year gets going. His close relationship with the US president takes on a new risk after Trump's intervention on Venezuela.
Based on years of interviewing Sir Keir Starmer, a former human rights lawyer who was against the war in Iraq, over his career, the idea he would be at ease with such action seems far-fetched.
He told me he was a "lifelong proponent of international law" but the public "simply do not have the complete details at the moment".
Some wanted him to denounce it prior to the interview. And the administration is likely to face more pressure to give an definitive view in Parliament in the next few days.
There has also long been growing desire in the Labour party to undo or remake some of the results of Brexit.
The PM denies he's doing that, but his new more concrete plan to integrate further with the EU's single market – the giant economic European market – will likely provoke protests that he is reneging on his vow never to try to overturn the decisions that stemmed from Brexit.
A commitment to integrate into more of the single market will satisfy many on his own side, but it is prime ammunition for Reform and the Conservatives to
A ceramic artist specializing in sustainable pottery, blending traditional techniques with contemporary aesthetics to create functional art.
