Interview: Jacky Tiotto, Cafcass chief executive

After four years turning around children's services in Bexley, Jacky Tiotto joined the Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service (Cafcass) in September. She replaces long-time chief executive Anthony Douglas, who stepped down in April. Whereas Bexley was struggling when Tiotto left Ofsted to become its director of children's services, Cafcass by contrast was recently rated "outstanding" by the inspectorate.

There has been a consistent fall in care applications for the past year. Will this continue?

The volume of applications is roughly the same in public law proceedings but there are four per cent fewer care applications for children to be removed from their parents. But that drop is replaced by other public law proceedings. They will be things like deprivation of liberty [orders], secure [accommodation] orders or emergency protection orders. What's been understood from that drop in care applications is that the public law system is less busy - but it isn't. Behaviour is changing in terms of what [orders] people are going into court for and we need to understand why that is. We will be prioritising work to understand that.