The statutory declaration should be made at the registry, and should contain the declarations referred to above regarding affinity.
Condition (2)
27. The recommended condition that "both parties agree to the marriage of their own free will" is clearly an admirable one in every way, though the Sub-Committee sees no practical way of enforcing it beyond imposing the requirement that banns be published, which appears to be the intention of the third condition of the Recommendation. The kind of inquiry which is conducted by the marriage registration authorities in modern China before permitting registration would probably not be appropriate to the conditions of Hong Kong.
Conditions (3), (4) and (5)
28. The Sub-Committee believes that the proposed requirement that due notice be given in accordance with the Marriage Ordinance must be applied to any marriage ceremony which precedes regis- tration, and not merely to the act of registration itself. (This would only be necessary if the Sub-Committee's recommendations on registration - see below, paragraph 34 - are not accepted). In other respects the Sub-Committee agrees with these conditions.
Condition (6)
29. The Sub-Committee was unfortunately unable to reach agreement on the subject of the nature and effect of the registration itself, a question which goes to the very root of the reforms proposed in the Report. On one important matter, however, the members were unanimous; it is clear that the validity of marriages contracted in accordance with the proposed legislation must be made to turn on the act of registration. In a modern legal system, marriage must be based on a legal act of constitutive effect, not merely on the recognition of social fact. However it may appear to the public as a whole, the juridical effect of legislation of the kind recommended in the Report will be the effective abolition of the existing forms of Chinese marriage as legal forms for all marriages taking place
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