A recent landmark legal case in the United Kingdom ruled on the vexed question of whether quotas are a private, tradable commodity or a public resource to be managed by governments for the public good.

The broad thrust of the High Court ruling in July was although questions of quota management are complex and should be seen against a background that fish stocks are a public resource, a long-established right to fish an established quota allocation amounts to a possession which cannot be taken away without compensation.

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