The Beaverbrook Art Gallery is entitled to $2.3 million in compensation for three paintings taken to England three decades ago and should get ownership of 133 disputed paintings, a lawyer for the gallery told an arbitration hearing in Fredericton on Thursday.

Larry Lowenstein ended his four days of closing arguments Thursday in a hearing that has stretched to more than a month.

The gallery insists the paintings were a gift from newspaper baron Lord Beaverbrook, but the British foundation that doles out Beaverbrook's estate says the paintings are only on loan, and wants them back.

Besides wanting the 133 paintings still in the building, the gallery is seeking compensation for three paintings taken to England in 1976.

The foundation said at the time that Lord Beaverbrook's favourite painting, Peasant Girl Gathering Faggots by Gainsborough, and two works by British painter George Stubbs needed restoration work.

But once the paintings were in England, the foundation decided to sell them. The foundation wanted to use the money to fend off three companies bidding to take over the Beaverbrook newspaper chain.

The chain was sold in June 1977, but the foundation put the paintings up for auction a week later anyway.

The Gainsborough and one Stubbs painting were sold, but the foundation kept the other Stubbs painting in England. The money the foundation received for the two that sold would equal $2.3 million today, according to Lowenstein.

The gallery says if the arbitrator finds that those paintings were owned by the gallery and improperly taken to England to be sold, the foundation should pay the gallery that $2.3 million in compensation and return the unsold Stubbs painting.

The foundation will respond to the claim in its closing arguments, which continue on Friday and are expected to stretch into next week.