Britain’s drippiest water bosses have banned a billionaire ally of Donald Trump from using the UK’s supply to fill his lake
Britain’s drippiest water bosses have banned a billionaire ally of Donald Trump from using the UK’s supply to fill his lake. Stephen Schwarzman, 78, founder of finance giant Blackstone, had been privately shipping in gallons of water to his 2,500-acre Conholt Park estate in Wiltshire.
But after a row with local residents hit by a hosepipe ban, Southern Water said the fat cat had now been banned from accessing local water supplies.
Southern’s Tim McMahon hit out: “I’m appalled by this use of water. It may not fall within hosepipe ban restrictions, but it’s not in the spirit of the incredible and ongoing community effort to save water across the county.
“As soon as we were aware we immediately investigated and banned tankers from abstracting from these standpipes.
“We’re also having robust conversations with those using this water and the companies working on their behalf.
“While this disappointing occurrence is highly unusual and rare, I would like to reassure customers that I am leading a thorough review into how this happened, and how we can tighten up both our internal monitoring processes and any legal loopholes so that this cannot happen again.”
Southern Water’s only came after press reports of fury from local residents about the use of the tankers by Schwarzman.
The company supplies on average 566-million litres of drinking water every day – but is losing 91-million litres daily through leakage.
It has also been slapped with a string of penalties for pollution, including a £90million fine in 2021 for illegally dumping sewage between 2010 and 2015 – leading to it being labelled one of the UK’s worst for pollution incidents at the time.
More recently, they received a £126million penalty from industry watchdog Ofwat in 2019 for failing to operate wastewater treatment sites and misreporting their performance.
Robin Catton, a local sheep farmer, blasted before Southern’s move to ban Schwarzman’s water use: “We’re on a hosepipe ban. Ethically, it’s not correct.”
Schwarzman is renowned as one of the world’s most powerful financiers.
He bought the sprawling Conholt Park three years ago for £82million and had been using 30 tankers of water a day to fill the nine million-gallon lake at his stately home – despite locals being hit with a hosepipe ban after the UK’s scorching summer temperatures.
Locals in neighbouring Hampshire – where a drought order is in place – filmed the billionaire’s trucks being filled up from standpipes around the clock.
Schwarzman is set to travel to London next week to attend a banquet with president Trump, 79, and King Charles, 76, during the US leader’s UK tour.
In 2011, the billionaire was slapped with a warning for excessive water use at his home in Palm Beach.
A spokesman for his UK estate said they “have done nothing wrong”.
A Blackstone spokesman added: “Following (the) request from Southern Water that water is not directed to the lake, the Estate has readjusted the supply of water accordingly.”
Schwarzman has an estimated worth of more than £30billion after founding Blackstone, hailed as one of the world’s largest investment management firms.
He has been renovating 17th Century Conholt shooting estate for the last three years, with additions including a three-acre lake.
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