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Administering the Dictation Test, 1950s

'If you wished to keep an immigrant out of Australia - and this could apply to anyone - you could apply the Dictation Test. That meant giving him a test in dictation in a language other than his own. We had to have an interpreter as well, to have it explained. It wasn't so difficult with the Chinese, because there were many Chinese restaurant proprietors. Often you'd pick the Sydney Morning Herald editorial, which most Australians probably couldn't understand anyway. You would read not less than 50 words. Some of us even made up our own tests:

"The harassed pedlar met the embarrassed cobbler in the cemetery gauging the symmetry of a lady's ankle in unparalleled ecstasy."

It was most embarrassing to stand there and watch the - you know, the look on their face, and you'd say "righto, well are you finished?" And there'd be a blank piece of paper. They then had to make a mark or sign their name at the bottom.

You assembled the documents, charged them at the police court. "It was a breach of the Immigration Act", and so on. They'd be held in jail until the hearing the next day. At the hearing you'd get up and say, "I applied the Dictation Test as follows". They'd then be found prohibited in terms of the Immigration Act and held at Her Majesty's pleasure pending deportation.

The heavens would open and fall on you if someone passed the Dictation Test. I could legally deputise a German to come in and give him Ethiopian. It was intended that no one passed. It was the ultimate weapon to keep people out of Australia.'

- Wall Moore, ex-Newcastle Customs Officer