North Staffordshire's popular Sunday newspaper, the Sentinel Sunday, has highlighted the soaring rate of bankruptcies locally compared to the national average.

The main news story of the day on Sunday, August 15th, followed pioneering work by Martin Williamson and the local Official Receiver for the area, Steven Fearns, to give local bankruptcy figures greater prominence.

Martin is a licensed Insolvency Practitioner and a Director of DS Insolvency Services (DSIS), part of the Dean Statham group. Earlier in the year, he had pointed out that families and businesses in North Staffordshire were facing a mountain of debt because it was far too easy to obtain credit.

In May, he warned: "This problem will only get more difficult in the future and there is a danger that the DTI statistics are the tip of the iceberg because many individuals with severe debt problems seek help from unregulated debt advisors who may not provide full and proper advice on alternatives to debt management".

In August, his prophetic words were seen to come true when it was revealed that twice as many people were going bankrupt in the area compared to the rest of the UK. The Sentinel Sunday reported his remarks and also quoted him as saying that recent redundancies in the pottery industry would only make matters worse as people struggled to cope with the loss of income.

Mr Fearns had enabled the local figures to be made available in this way for the first time. All local bankruptcies pass through the Official Receiver's office.

In the same issue of the newspaper, Deputy Business Editor David Elks ran a feature on Martin's home and professional life under the headline "I aim to apply the kiss of life" - a reference to the fact that Martin's main aim is to is to rescue companies and save as many jobs as possible.

This article took readers through a typical day in Martin's life, but concentrated on the key aspects of his work as an Insolvency Practitioner dealing with businesses, companies and individuals with financial problems.

In order to be in a position to save a company in trouble, insolvency practitioners needed to have a good understanding of how an individual business worked, why it was in trouble and how disaster could be avoided.

Acting speedily was the most important aspect, he stressed, giving the example of a construction company that was in a crisis because its customers had not paid up. There was a much better chance of a successful outcome if early action was taken. Trading figures were important but only accounted for 25 per cent of the whole picture.

"The accounts don't reflect what plans the company has for the future. Nor do they fully show whether the directors have the ability and energy to make the changes", he told the Sentinel Sunday.

His various roles include being able to pacify angry creditors, look after anxious directors and talk to staff who were concerned about their jobs. The worst part of his job was having to make people redundant. He had been made redundant himself once so he knew how hard it could be.

It was not pleasant - but sometimes it was better to cut a workforce from 60 to 10 in order to save a business.

One of the big positives in his work was that he never knew what he would be doing the next day.

"I could be advising a corner shop one day and running a £10 million business the next", said Martin.