Communication No. 358/1989 Submitted by: R. L., M. B., M. H. (names deleted) and 14 other members of the Whispering Pines Band (represented by counsel) Date of communication: 1 April 1989 Alleged victims: The authors State party: Canada Declared inadmissible: 5 November 1991 (forty-third session) Subject matter: Interpretation of Bill C-31 regulating “Indian” status* engage in raising cattle on 1,200 acres (750 ha) of land. Procedural issues: Notion of victim—Nonexhaustion of domestic remedies 2.2 The communication challenges certain aspects of Bill C-31, i.e. the legislation which was enacted by the Government of Canada in 1985 in response to the recommendations of the Human Rights Committee in its Views in the case of Sandra Lovelace v. Canada.1 By virtue of Bill C-31 certain persons formerly deprived of “Indian” status on the basis of sex were reinstated, but at the same time, other persons who formerly enjoyed Indian status were deprived of it on the basis of a racial quota. Substantive issues: Right of self-determination— Collective character of this right Articles of the Covenant: 1(1) and 27 Articles of the Optional Protocol: 1 and 5(2)(b) 1. The authors of the communication (initial submission dated 1 April 1989 and subsequent correspondence) are Chief R. L., M. B., M. H. and 14 other members of the Whispering Pines Indian Band, residing in the province of British Columbia, Canada. The authors allege violations by the Government of Canada of article 1, paragraph 1, article 2, paragraph 1, articles 17, 22, 23, 26 and 27 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. They are represented by counsel. 2.3 Owing to the small size of the Band, members frequently marry non-members. Because of its geographical isolation from other Shuswap communities and in view of the relative proximity to the city of Kamloops, social contact and inter-marriage with non-Indians has been common. Traditional Indian membership rules allowed for considerable flexibility and facilitated the incorporation of non- members into the various bands. Problems allegedly started with the enactment of the original Indian Act, 1876, which imposed the Euro-Canadian concept of patrilineal kinship and inheritance on the indigenous peoples of Canada. To be considered an “Indian” under the Indian Act, a person had to be the biological child of an Indian father, or have been adopted by an Indian father in accordance with Canadian family law. The Indian Act also provided that women would take their legal status from their husbands. A Shuswap woman who married a non-Indian Canadian continued to belong to her childhood band under Shuswap law, .but became “white” under the Indian Act. Likewise, although a “white” Canadian woman who married a Shuswap became a member of her husband’s The facts as submitted by the authors 2.1 The Whispering Pines Indian Band belongs to the Shuswap Nation in south-central British Columbia. The Shuswap are the indigenous people of the region and constitute a single social, cultural, political and linguistic community distinct both from Euro-Canadians and from neighbouring indigenous peoples. Approximately half of the contemporary members of the Band live in a small farming community numbering about 26 persons and * The Human Rights Committee, in an early decision Sandra Lovelace v. Canada, recommended the promulgation of a Bill regulating the status of “Indians” within Canada (see communication No. 24/1977; Selected Decisions of the Human Rights Committee, vol. 1, pp. 83 et seq.). See for a similar position the Committee’s Views in communication No. 167/1984 (B. Ominayak and the Lubicon Lake Band v. Canada), 26 March 1990, paragraph 32.1, contained in Selected Decisions under the Optional Protocol, vol. 3, p. 78. 1 Communication No. 24/1977; see Selected Decisions of the Human Rights Committee, vol. I, pp. 83 et seq. See also the statement by the Government of Canada concerning the implementation of the Views in the case of Lovelace, in ibid., Selected Decisions, vol. II, pp. 224 et seq. 16