The Fairs Act 1871 empowered the secretary of state for the Home Department to, on petition, make orders for the abolition of fairs. Such provision was made at this time by parliament because many fairs traditionally held in early Victorian England were, according to the preamble to the act, held to be

1. unnecessary,
2. the cause of grievous immorality, and
3. very injurious to the inhabitants of the towns in which such fairs are held

One such fair, subsequently abolished, was the St Matthew's Fair in Bury St Edmunds.