Ecclesiastical Titles Act 1871
1871 c.53
An Act to repeal an Act for preventing the assumption of certain Ecclesiastical Titles in respect of places in the United Kingdom.
[24th July 1871]

Whereas by an Act passed in the session of Parliament held in the fourteenth and fifteenth years of the reign of Her Majesty, chapter sixty, intituled, “An Act to prevent the assumption of certain Ecclesiastical Titles in respect of places in the United Kingdom,” certain enactments were made prohibiting under penalties the assumption of the title of archbishop or bishop of a pretended province or diocese, or archbishop or bishop of a city, place, or territory, or dean of any pretended deanery in England or Ireland, not being the see, province, or diocese of an archbishop or bishop or deanery of any dean recognised by law:
Short title given by Short Titles Act 1896 (c. 14)
This Act is not necessarily in the form in which it has effect in Northern Ireland
1851 c. 60.
And whereas no ecclesiastical title of honour or dignity derived from any see, province, diocese, or deanery recognised by law, or from any city, town, place, or territory within this realm, can be validly created, nor can any such see, province, diocese, or deanery be validly created, nor can any pre-eminence or coercive power be conferred otherwise than under the authority and by the favour of Her Majesty, her heirs and successors, and according to the laws of this realm; but it is not expedient to impose penalties upon those ministers of religion who may, as among the members of the several religious bodies to which they respectively belong, be designated by distinctions regarded as titles of office, although such designation may be connected with the name of some town or place within the realm:

1 14 & 15 Vict. c. 60 repealed.
The said Act of the session of Parliament held in the fourteenth and fifteenth years of the reign of Her Majesty, chapter sixty, shall be and the same is hereby repealed: Provided that such repeal shall not nor shall anything in this Act contained be deemed in any way to authorize or sanction the conferring or attempting to confer any rank, title, or precedence, authority, or jurisdiction on or over any subject of this realm by any person or persons in or out of this realm, other than the Sovereign thereof.