Trust-in the BFMS

A Blogpost where I explore how the British False Memory Society was funded

The membership subscription forms that were first sent out to prospective members of the British False Memory Society (BFMS) were of two kinds, one for regular members and the other for professionals. The ordinary subscription at the time they started was £25 which then went up a few years later to £30. 

Above: Subscription form for the BFMS. 1999

According to one of their former directors the BFMS also received a ”pump to prime” grant from the Department of Health in their first three years of existence.

”We won three years of pump priming funding from the Department of Health,
although I clearly recall the problems, we encountered in claiming the final tranche following the change of Government in 1997.” (1)

I don’t know how much the grant from the Department of Health was. I wrote to the British Government’s Department of Health and Social Care to find out about this in accordance with the Freedom of Information Act. They told me they couldn’t find it because grant making was not centralised at the time and their computer search engines don’t allow searches to be filtered by date.  

”At the time in question (the 1990s), grant making in DHSC was not centralised, and so information relating to the different stages in the process may have been recorded in the files of separate teams (for example, from when an application was considered and assessed,  to when it was awarded and paid), which again makes locating this information difficult. 

Even with electronic records within these filing systems, we are unable to reliably filter by date; metadata available to use in these systems does not allow results to be refined by date for most items in the repository. Dates/years can be included as a keyword, but that relies on the date/year being present in the body or title of the document, and may not reflect when the document was created, amended  filed. ” 

Well that’s that then.

A 2024 article in The Sceptic revealed that the BFMS was financed from a ”solicitors office” in London. (2) This office is called Payne Hicks Beach and its website says it serves the needs of

 ”high net worth individuals and their families can find themselves needing the protection of lawyers at a moment’s notice.” (3)

According to an article in the Norwegian business newspaper, Dagens Naeringsliv, Payne Hicks Beach has a long history of managing the wealth of  heirs to one of Norway’s richest families , presumably because they pay less tax if they are managed from London than in Oslo. The newspaper article describes these heirs as Norway’s `Dynasty´, who have:

”The fastest cars, the steepest hills, the biggest boats, and the fittest horses. Add African antelope hunting, a ten-million-kroner party at Kunstnernes Hus, and frequent visits from the economic crime police.” (4)

In 1993 one of the members of this dynasty, Guri Scotford (married to Roger Scotford who started the BFMS) set up a trust called the Odin Charitable Trust and registered it with the Charity Commission of England and Wales, which means it does not pay income tax.

”The Odin Charitable Trust is a registered charity and therefore is not liable to income tax or corporation tax on income or gains derived from its charitable activities as they fall within the exemptions available to registered charities.” (5)

Also in 1993, the Scotfords set up a telephone helpline called Adult Children Accusing Parents. In January 1994, the first BFMS newsletter said that the phoneline had been incorporated into the charity BFMS. According to the contact details, Both Odin and the BFMS were both from the same adress in Bradford -on-Avon.  Guri and Roger Scotford are now both deceased, the BFMS no longer exists and the Odin Charitable Trust is now run from a different adress.  In 2024 its listed investments were worth  £10,718,416 of which £3,777,826 was held overseas. It gave £226,000 to other registered charities,(5) which amounts to 2.11% of its income.

 When I first looked at their accounts on the Charity Commission website about ten years ago, the Odin Charitable trust was giving £46,000 to the BFMS every year. (6) Later this amount became less and eventually stopped. the last Odin donation to the BFMS was £20000 in 2018 (7) The name on the accounts was always just BFMS, the full name British False Memory Society was never used. It also gave a number of small donations to other charities of up to £5000 a year. I wrote to the Charity Commission to ask if I could see the accounts from earlier years and they replied that they didn’t have them.

The Odin Trust also funded research into False Memory  and I found this information because the researchers themselves mentioned it in their publications. I wrote about these on my previous blog here.(8) The BFMS also self-pubished three books from Bradford-on Avon (9) , one of which was launched at the House of Lords (10). So I wonder if these were funded by the Odin Charitable Trust also?

Information about the BFMS finances has been difficult to find. The journalist Beatrix Campbell wrote a book where she mentioned the Scotford’s wealth but she was threatened with legal action by a psychiatrist  and the book was not allowed to be sold.

Above: Photograph of BFMS newsletter reporting on Beatrix Campbell’s book 

I haven’t been able to find any mention of the Odin Charitable Trust in the BFMS newsletters. In their first January 1994 newsletter they say that they will rely on subscriptions and donations, but don’t name any donors.

More information has been published about Guri Scotford’s wealth in Norway. This is because her son from a previous marriage was at one time in frequent legal trouble and the subject of many newspaper articles, some of which mention his mother. Last year he gave an interview in which he said he was the source of several stories featured in the TV series Exit, a dramatization of the purportedly real life stories of Norwegian tax exiles.(11 ) 

More recently he has set up hs own YouTube channel where he talks about his life. In his most recent video, he complained that he had to pay too much tax because the Norwegian Government does not understand inherited Trusts and he has to pay tax on them.(12) 

1. Greenhalgh, M. `Nearly Thirty Years`. The Newsletter of the British False Memory Society  Vol. 30.., No. . 2 – December 2022
2. Grossman, W. ´British False Memory Society´. Fen 2023. Skeptical Inquirer.
3. Law and the State – Payne Hicks Beach.
4. ´Dynastiet på Norsk´.Dagens Naeringsliv,14.09.02 (translated by GPT chat) 
5. Odin – Charity Accounts 2024(12662795.1).xls. 
6. http://apps.charitycommission.gov.uk/Showcharity/RegisterOfCharities/CharityWithoutPartB.aspx?RegisteredCharityNumber=1027521&SubsidiaryNumber=0 This link no longer takes you to the Odin Accounts. However when I was first trying to find out about this it did.
7. The last grant of the Trust to the BFMS (£20,000) was in 2018 (8).  The Odin Charitable Trust report and accounts 5th April 2018. https://register-of-charities.charitycommission.gov.uk/charity-search/-/charity-details/1027521/accounts-and-annual-returns , This link no longer takes you to the specified Odin Account. However when I was first trying to find out about this it did
8. The non-closure of the British False Memory Society (BFMS) – THE FALSE MEMORY TROPE COLLECTION
9. These books are (1) Axelrad, Brigitte: The Ravages of False Memories – or Manipulated Memory, Bradford on Avon 2011, ISBN: 978-0-9555184-2-3. (2) Brand, Norman (ed.): Fractured Families, Bradford on Avon 2007, ISBN: 978-0-9555184-0-9. (3) Brand, Norman et al.: Miscarriage of Memory, Bradford on Avon 2010, ISBN: 978-0-9555184-1-6. This information is from the website of False Memory Deutschland, the only false memory organisation that may still be in existence, although it hasn’t been updated for a while. Literature and Media on False Memories – False Memory Deutschland e.V
10.  In Felstead, K @ French, C. Dr James Ost’s contributions to the work of the British False Memory Society. `Memory´. Vol 30 No 6.
11.  Holth, V. Han skylder meg et helt liv
12. WACtH THIS IF YOU ARE HAVING A DIFFICULT SITUATION