The University of Leeds is a pretty good school as far as reputation goes. Historically, it is one of the original six "red brick" universities so that is moderately prestigious. It also has a good business model and thus is fairly rich - meaning the facilities are good, money is spent on research and keeping the place maintained etc. If you look at the rankings Chrono linked to then ~30th is very good.
http://extras.timesonline.co.uk/tol_gug/gooduniversityguide.php - this gives you an idea of the unis above and below Leeds and it is keeping good company. I don't know anyone that has studied there but I did look around the university myself when I was applying and I was happy with it (in the end I didn't apply there but that's for a completely unrelated reason), the campus was nice, the students I met were nice, the few lecturers I met seemed intelligent and so forth. According to that link I pasted 75% of the students are satisfied with it, that seems fairly high. It's a renowned place because of historical status and that means a lot - prestige comes hand in hand with the age of a university a lot of the time. The education level is easily one of the highest in this country and it's a popular university with lots of applications. With it being research orientated your subject fits in nicely there, so that would probably be a bonus. I would recommend the school as a positive experience of education in Britain, so go for it.
Also, the city of Leeds is fairly nice (as northern cities go!), it has a great dining scene and is culturally diverse. Shopping is good there too, I am led to believe.
Good luck and I hope that all helps!
