increasingly negative effect on the authors' families if their children marry non-Indians in the same proportions as their parents. To avoid the termination of family lines through the operation of section 6(2) of Bill C-31, the authors would have to arrange all future marriages of band members with members of other Bands. This is said to force them to choose between gradually losing their legal rights and their reserve land, and depriving their children of personal freedom and privacy/ which would be incompatible with the Covenant and the Canadian Charter of Bights and Freedoms. 3.2 Another current problem is that 28 persons who are not directly related to the families now residing on the reserve have applied for Indian status and Band membership. This would entail a 50 per cent increase in housing requirements, which the Band cannot meet. So as to accommodate new members, the Band would have to develop a cluster-housing project requiring new water wells, sewer systems and power lines, at an estimated cost of 223,000 Canadian dollars. Federal adjustment assistance under Bill C-31 is, however, extremely limited. Even if new members could be housed on the reserve, there is very little possibility of ensuring their employment. Cultural problems also arise, because some of the newcomers have never lived on an Indian reserve and others have lived off-reserve for more than 10 years. Considering that most are single, older adults without children, their social impact on a community, which has consisted of three to four self-sufficient farm families, would be overwhe Iming. 3.3 The authors believe that the Committee's views in the Lovelace case confirm that States cannot unreasonably restrict freedom of association and cohabitation of individual families, nor of the related families which comprise an ethnic, religious or linguistic community. The authors consider that their "freedom of association with others " (art. 22, para. 1) has been interfered with, in that they cannot themselves determine membership in their small farming community. They can be forced to share their limited land and resources with persons who acquire Indian status and membership, while their own direct descendants may lose the right to be part of the community. 3.4 It is submitted that the implementation of Bill C-31 constitutes "arbitrary and unlawful interference" with the authors' families (art. 17, para. 1 ) , on account of the fact that the Government, and not the Band, determines who may live on the reserve. Moreover, this interference is said to be arbitrary in that it distinguishes among family members on the basis of whether they were born before or after 17 April 1985, and in that it distinguishes among family members on the basis of whether one or both of their parents were Indiana, a purely racial criterion contrary to articles 2, paragraph 1, and 26 of the Covenant. 3.5 The implementation of Bill C-31 allegedly conflicts with article 23 of the Covenant, in that it restricts the freedom of Band members to choose their own spouses, particularly considering that marriage to non-Indians would result in disenfranchising the children. 3.6 Further, the authors claim a violation of article 26 of the Covenant, which prohibits "any discrimination" on the ground of race, in that it makes racial quantum, rather than cultural factors and individual allegiance, the basis for allocating indigenous rights and indigenous peoples' lands. Traditional Shuswap law regarded as Shuswap anyone who was born in the -360-

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