Town and country planning in Britain (The New local government series)

(If I were to recommend one book that every planning student should buy, this would be it. It gives a comprehensive description of every aspect of planning in bite size chunks. It does not go into oodles of detail but has suggestions at every point concerning further reading, always a good place to start for an essay. This is an excellent source of UK Planning Law and Practice for, in particular, overseas students who have no prior knowledge of the UK Planning system. It provides a critical discussion of the system of planning the institutions involved, the plans and other instruments that are used, the procedures for controlling development and land use change, and the mechanisms for implementing policy and proposals)