- The Guardian
- Issue #2174
This last issue of Guardian, the Workers’ Weekly for 2025 comes to you on the edge of the ‘silly season,’ a time when everyone is thinking end-of-the-year celebrations and holidays. Media-wise, it’s a time for roundups of the year. We have a couple of roundups here too: our front page, and a message from the Communist Party of Australia’s President.
Media roundups tend to go through a list of the year’s big news items: Labor defeated a woeful Trump-lite opposition that ran on impossible nuclear power, racism and making life harder for working women. COP30 came and went. Labor okayed the North-West Shelf extension and continued to pretend to care about climate change. Israel continued its onslaught on Palestine. Fighting continued in Ukraine.
What’s missing from this list is you and the people you know. 2025 has been a year of grass-roots action. Here are some highlights.
Every week of 2025, this newspaper reported on union wins. Unions are demonised (think CFMEU) marginalised, or ignored by most of the Australian media, but they’re still there, kicking goals for working people. It’s not just union officials (or “union bosses” as other media outlets routinely call elected and responsible officials). It’s also union members, working people taking action. If you’re working and you’re not in a union, join it! If you’re a member, get active! Read the union news, take part in union elections, get into it! Unions are where a lot of class action starts.
Thousands of individual Australians helped keep the pressure up on Labor about its support for Israel. Thousands supported their unions, lobbied politicians about action on climate change and turned up in support of Indigenous rights.
So here’s to you and the people you know.
Of course, it’s not just you on your own. Grass roots action is a lot more than an individual taking action. It needs organisation and education. Every week Communist Party of Australia members get together with other comrades to learn theory and plan the actions they’re going to take. This paper is part of that process, helping people stay informed about what’s happening here and internationally.
Most weeks of this year, Communist Party of Australia members went to pro-Palestine demonstrations. CPA members march, provide marshals and of course sell Guardian the Workers’ Weekly. We took part in other demonstrations too – in support of Venezuela, to take action on Invasion Day, against Aboriginal deaths in custody, and against AUKUS. In this issue you’ll see comrades demonstrating against the disgraceful attempt by Poland to ban its communist party. CPA members also took part in support for socialist Cuba, celebrated the Sri Lankan communist party, the JVP’s 60th anniversary, and kept up active relations with China, Vietnam, Laos, and the DPRK.
In 2026, the Communist Party of Australia will hold its 15th Congress in Naarm (Melbourne). This happens once every four years and decides the party’s political direction and actions for the four years ahead. It also elects the comrades who will lead the party until the next Congress. It’s a vigorously democratic process – comrades around the country have been working on the draft Political Resolution all year. The Congress needs support. We urge you to donate to the Congress appeal.
We wish all our readers a good December and a happy New Year, however you celebrate. Guardian, the Workers Weekly will be back on Monday 19 January 2026. In the meantime, stay in touch by keeping an eye on the Party’s social media, and write to editor@cpa.org.au if you’ve got something to say.
