On the case with the Cafcass intake team

The Coventry headquarters of Cafcass (Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service) are bright and welcoming contrasting against the gloom of a chilly spring morning. Passing through a high-ceilinged atrium, members of the organisation's intake team head to their desks to start work.

The team was not always based at the modern-looking National Business Centre. When set up in 2010, there were just five people in an office in Birmingham, trialling a process that was to become central to the service's way of working.

Before that, private law applications to the family court were processed by social workers in 93 local offices, using a number of different, often inconsistent, methods. The information they gathered was vital in helping courts ensure the safety of children at a first hearing, but the process could take up to three months and a significant backlog of cases built up. In 2010, the Commons public accounts committee declared Cafcass "not fit for purpose", citing poor management information systems as well as poor staff morale.