Product Description

Building on the strengths of the Sourcebook on Public Law, this book has been comprehensively revised to take account of the radical programme of constitutional reform introduced by the Labour Government since 1997.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #324255 in Books
• Published on: 2003-08-01
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 1150 pages

Review

"the largest and best collection of cases and materials on constitutional law published to date" - Public Law [1997] 361. 

'the largest and best collection of cases and materials on constitutional law published to date' - Journal of Public Law

About the Author

Helen Fenwick, BA, LLB, is Professor of Law at Durham University. She teaches Civil Liberties and Media Law. She is author of Civil Liberties (Cavendish Publishing Ltd) and has published widely in the field.

Gavin Phillipson, BA, LLM (Cantab), Solicitor, is a Lecturer in Law at Durham University. He teaches Constitutional Law and Civil Liberties and has published numerous articles in the field of public law and human rights.

Customer Reviews

Excellent but Out of Date
This is a very thorough book, but as with all thorough books it is not for those new to (public) law. I bought this book at the very start of my first year LLB, but only picked it up and truly read it when I was revising for my exams. Before that I was always bogged down by unknown terms (e.g. referring to something as "Wednesbury unreasonable" 20 chapters before the term is explained).

With a decent background-knowledge from other books and the lectures, this was an excellent book to read and revise for the exams (in part, also, because I was honoured to have mr. Phillipson as a lecturer throughout the first half of the year).

The chapters are neatly written with a lot of attention to detail where necessary, the text is written in a logical order, it often gives helpful summaries and also gives the relevant case-extracts alongside the text - thus creating a textbook and casebook all in one.

However, the book is desperately out of date. How out of date? Well, it refers to the 'impending Iraq war'. Naturally, public law has evolved much since (and often because of) the beginning of the war (e.g. the debate about the Royal Prerogative to declare war, and a lot of debate about ministerial accountability to Parliament and what constitutes a lie or a misleading statement). There are thus also important parts missing from the book, such as the Constitutional Reform Act 2005.

There were rumours around the university that mr. Phillipson was working on a new - updated - edition, but I don't think that has been published yet (July 2007) - to the chagrin of many students who put off purchasing the book, opting to wait for the new edition.

Best Book purchase I've made this academic year!
Have found this book extremely useful for indepth explanation of many aspects of my Public Law module which makes up part of my LLB course. The range of articles it quotes from in particular make it an excellent source for differing opinions on many areas. Despite it's detail, it is not difficult reading. This text is well laid out, making good use of section headings, and is very up to date. I would recommend it without any hesitation to any Public Law / Administrative Law student who wishes to know more than the bare minimum required to pass.