Question to the Cabinet Office:

To ask the Minister for the Cabinet Office, which (a) towns or cities and (b) other bodies have sought permission from his Department to use the word Royal in a proposed name since 1 January 2014; and which of those requests for permission have been (i) approved and (ii) refused.

Use of the protected title ‘Royal’ is conferred by the Queen acting on the advice of
Ministers. No grants to towns and cities have been made since 2014

Details of the applications are not disclosed to protect their confidentiality, however the
number of applications received by the Cabinet Office for all protected titles including
those containing the word ‘Royal’, was 906 in 2018. The Cabinet Office objected to 107 of
these, issued a non-objection to 703 and approved 14. The remaining cases are still being
considered or were closed without a resolution.