How Citizen Investigators Are Turning Outrage into Evidence-Based Reform
By Steve Conley | Academy of Life Planning & Get SAFE Fellowship
1. A Folk Tale That Struck a Nerve
A decade ago, a film and lecture series titled The Great British Mortgage Swindle swept through online communities of disillusioned homeowners. Its creator, Michael of Bernicia (Michael O’Deira), claimed that Britain’s mortgage system was “a vast fraud,” arguing that banks never lent real money and that all mortgages were legally void.
For years, the establishment dismissed it as pseudo-law — a populist echo of the American “Freeman-on-the-Land” movement. But beneath its theatrical claims lies a kernel of truth that society can no longer afford to ignore.
Today, through the Get SAFE Fellowship, we’re uncovering the real mechanics behind what Bernicia misread as conspiracy — the machinery of securitisation, judicial ambiguity, and structural collusion that underpins much of the UK’s mortgage market.
2. What the “Swindle” Got Right — and Wrong
In his lectures, O’Deira told an electrifying story:
“You signed a promise to pay £400,000, and that paper became the bank’s asset.
They sold it, bonded it, insured it, and multiplied it — all without risking a penny.”
It’s not literally true — but it’s symbolically accurate. Here’s why:
| The Claim | The Reality |
|---|---|
| “The bank never lent money.” | The bank created credit — money as debt — backed by your signature. That’s how modern banking works. |
| “Your mortgage was sold without your consent.” | True. Most UK residential mortgages are securitised within weeks — their beneficial ownership transferred to SPVs. |
| “The note was paid off by insurance.” | Partly true. Credit default swaps and insurance contracts do reduce investor losses — but borrowers remain liable. |
| “MERS or similar systems broke the chain of title.” | In the US, yes. In the UK, equivalent opacity exists through covered bond structures and undisclosed assignments. |
| “All mortgages are void.” | No. But some are legally ambiguous — as confirmed in Lloyds Bank plc v Cook [2025], which reopened the question of standing and beneficial ownership. |
Bernicia mistook structural opacity for conspiracy. Yet the grievances that fed his movement were born of genuine institutional silence.
3. The Structural Truth Behind the Myth
When you strip away the rhetoric, The Great British Mortgage Swindle inadvertently predicted the core fault lines now surfacing in British courts and Parliament:
- Ownership Ambiguity: Borrowers are never told who really owns their loan once securitised.
- Judicial Ambiguity: Contradictory precedents (Three Rivers, Pender, Cook) mean courts can’t agree who has the right to repossess.
- Disclosure Failure: Regulators and lenders kept borrowers in the dark about transfers of beneficial interest.
- Moral Hazard: Insurers and investors profit whether borrowers pay or default.
- Regulatory Capture: Oversight bodies remain silent for fear of destabilising financial markets.
The problem isn’t fraud — it’s structural untrustworthiness.
Complex systems conceal accountability behind a maze of legal fictions.
4. The Role of Get SAFE: From Rebellion to Reform
Where Bernicia urged defiance, Get SAFE builds due process.
We train ordinary citizens to become AI-empowered investigators, capable of tracing beneficial ownership, decoding securitisation chains, and identifying unlawful enforcement.
Through the Get SAFE Fellowship, survivors of financial exploitation collaborate to expose patterns of misconduct, not through pseudo-law, but through evidence:
- Case audits using public filings and prospectuses.
- AI-assisted document analysis for hidden linkages between banks, SPVs, and trustees.
- Professional advocacy connecting victims, regulators, and journalists.
It’s the same spirit of defiance — but grounded in truth and transparency.
5. Why This Matters for Financial Planners and Policymakers
For holistic wealth planners and citizen advocates, this movement changes the terrain.
Financial planning is no longer just about portfolios and pensions — it’s about protecting structural trust.
Policymakers, too, must face an uncomfortable reality:
If courts now acknowledge that securitisation affects enforceability, every repossession becomes a potential test of legal standing and systemic accountability.
The task ahead is not to dismantle finance, but to re-engineer its integrity.
6. From Myth to Mechanism: Building Structural Trustworthiness
Get SAFE and the Academy of Life Planning are working to build a citizen-led ecosystem of transparency, where no borrower or investor is left in the dark about who holds power over their assets.
Our model is simple:
| Old Paradigm | New Paradigm |
|---|---|
| Opaque finance | Transparent structure |
| Corporate secrecy | Citizen oversight |
| Compliance culture | Ethical accountability |
| Intermediated advice | Empowered planning |
Together, we are turning the energy of public outrage into the architecture of structural trust.
7. Conclusion: A Swindle No More
Michael of Bernicia gave language to a feeling millions shared — that something was deeply wrong with the financial system.
He was half-right.
The “swindle” wasn’t a secret plot; it was a structural design that made opacity profitable and accountability optional.
Now, through Get SAFE, that design is being decoded — and citizens are reclaiming their rightful role as regulators of truth.
Because when transparency becomes the default, justice is no longer a privilege — it’s a structure.
đź”— Call to Action
👉 Learn more about The Securitisation Trap and the Get SAFE Fellowship.
👉 Join our next Citizen Investigator Workshop and help rebuild structural trustworthiness from the ground up.
Get SAFE: A Fellowship for Those Walking Through Fire
Get SAFE is becoming what people are desperately searching for —
a structured, ethical, trauma-informed community for:
- victims of financial exploitation
- whistleblowers
- bereaved families
- citizen investigators
- advocates and moral leaders
The Fellowship is simple but profound:
We gather to recover agency, share truth, deepen courage, and support one another in the long path from harm to justice.
We are not aligned with any regulator, political system, or institution.
Our strength is our independence.
People came alive when they heard it:
“A Fellowship of truth, justice, and recovery — not a bureaucracy.”
“A place where victims are finally believed.”
“A community rooted in courage, not compliance.”
And because of the AI frameworks we’ve introduced, this Fellowship is not just emotional support — it is practical empowerment.
For the first time, ordinary people can:
- build digital dossiers
- reconstruct timelines
- detect patterns of institutional misconduct
- write letters with authority
- expose evidence regulators overlooked
- collaborate safely across cases
- turn pain into purpose
This is how movements begin.
Planning My Life: Preventing Exploitation Before It Starts
What the event also confirmed is this:
People fall into financial exploitation when they fall out of sovereignty.
Planning My Life sits exactly at this junction.
It teaches people:
- how to think independently
- how to plan their lives before planning their money
- how to identify institutional risk
- how to spot predatory sales patterns
- how to avoid product-led advice
- how to stay structurally trustworthy
- how to build a life where no adviser can mislead, confuse, or coerce them
Prevention and recovery are two halves of the same circle.
Get SAFE rescues those already harmed.
Planning My Life equips people so it never happens again.
Together, they form a complete empowerment system.
A New Model of Justice Is Emerging — Built by the People Themselves
The collective energy of the event revealed a truth that no institution dares speak:
When regulators fail, citizens take up the role of regulator.
When governance collapses, the governed take up the role of governance.
When truth is buried, truth-tellers become archivists of justice.
The movement we are seeing now is not political.
It is human.
It is built on:
- transparency
- dignity
- courage
- integrity
- collective intelligence
- and the healing power of community
These are the values Paul Moore lived and died for.
This event honoured him not by remembering his warnings —
but by continuing his fight.
Where We Go From Here
The Academy of Life Planning now carries a responsibility that is both moral and strategic:
To give people the tools to understand their lives,
their finances,
and their evidence —
so exploitation no longer survives in the shadows.
Through:
- Planning My Life (self-sovereignty)
- Get SAFE (justice and recovery)
- AI-as-co-pilot (pattern recognition, empowerment, clarity)
- The Fellowship (community and courage)
- The GAME Plan (a universal cycle of intention-to-manifestation)
…we are building the world that institutions promised but failed to deliver.
A world where truth has a home.
A world where victims are lifted, not shunned.
A world where ordinary people can finally stand equal to the powers that harmed them.
A world where transparency is not a slogan —
it is a lived practice that restores dignity, agency, and hope.
This is the movement Paul Moore began.
This is the movement that rose in that meeting.
This is the movement we now carry forward.
And we will not stop until every victim finds their voice,
every truth comes to light,
and every life stolen by exploitation is honoured through justice.
In One Sentence
Goliathon turns victims of financial exploitation into confident, capable citizen investigators who can build professional-grade cases using structured training, emotional support, and independent AI.
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Every year, thousands across the UK lose their savings, pensions, and peace of mind to corporate financial exploitation — and are left to face the aftermath alone.
Get SAFE (Support After Financial Exploitation) exists to change that.
We’re creating a national lifeline for victims — offering free emotional recovery, life-planning, and justice support through our Fellowship, Witnessing Service, and Citizen Investigator training.
We’re now raising £20,000 to:
Register Get SAFE as a Charity (CIO)
Build our website, CRM, and outreach platform
Fund our first year of free support and recovery programmes
Every £50 donation provides a bursary for one survivor — giving access to the tools, training, and community needed to rebuild life and pursue justice with confidence.
Your contribution doesn’t just fund a project — it fuels a movement.
Support the Crowdfunder today and help us rebuild lives and restore justice.
Join us at: http://www.aolp.info/getsafe
steve.conley@aolp.co.uk | +44 (0)7850 102070
Academy of Life Planning 