Racially based immigration policies

My essay on assimilation is due today, but I've been given an inadvertant extension, due to delays in receiving feedback for my first essay. That feedback arrived today, and I'm very happy with the results. The first essay was on the economic depression of the 1890s, and how the trade union movement pushed a vision of national identity which focused on race, in order to block the import of cheap Asian labour, particularly on Queensland sugarcane plantations. Of course, the connecting point between this and the subject of the next essay (assimilation), is the White Australia Policy, which guided Australian immigration policy for around 70 years. A central plank of this policy was the diction test, whereby potential immigrants could be tested on their knowledge of a European language. The trap was that the immigration officials got to choose the European language, so even if an Asian immigrant was fluent in English, the test could be done in German. Thus, impartiality could be claimed, averting any claims of racially-biased immigration policies. It was a thin disguise for an obviously racist policy. In the news today - recent calls for compulsory English language tests, and knowledge of 'Australian values'. It's shaky ground, not necessarily because of any implicit racism in such a task, but because of the ambiguity of 'Australian values', and whose definitions we attempt to enforce.