A legal representative's failure to appreciate the significance of an opponent's pleading, based on a misapprehension or lack of understanding rather than a failure to act diligently on known obligations, may properly be characterised as 'inadvertence' rather than 'neglect' for the purposes of an application to reopen after delivery of reasons but before perfection of orders. The underlying merits of the dispute remain a proper consideration in such applications; the delivery of reasons does not render the justice of the case irrelevant. Costs following a successful reopening application are properly assessed by reference to the ultimate substantive disposition, consistent with the principle that amendments operate nunc pro tunc.
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