Functional testing Laravel ViewComposer

I am trying to test controllers in Laravel using the standard set up this works fine. The test below passes.

class ExampleTest extends TestCase {



/**
 * A basic functional test example.
 *
 * @return void
 */
public function testBasicExample()
{

    $crawler = $this->client->request('GET', '/');
    $this->assertTrue($this->client->getResponse()->isOk());
}

However once I introduce a ViewComposer - registered with a ServiceProvider

class MenuComposer {

const NONE = 0;
const READWRITE = 1;
const READONLY = 2;




/**
 * constructor largely for testing purposes
 * @param View $view
 * @param Auth $auth
 */
public function __construct()
{



}

public function compose($view)
{
    $access = $this->getAccessLevel();

    $view->with('menuItems',$this->menuItems($access));

}

The production code works as expected - but the test fails because it **ErrorException: Trying to get property of non-object (View: **

So the $view variable passed into the compose method is null/empty ? Can anyone suggest what I could do to make tests run and continue to use the viewcomposer functionality?