Jacob Rees-Mogg and the mystery of the conference recess

“What is going on with the conference recess?” asked Valerie Vaz during Jacob Rees-Mogg’s first outing for Business Questions as Leader of the House. She sounded exasperated, and who can blame her? After all, it was the sixth week in a row she asked the question. And it was the sixth week that she was fobbed off. So what is going on? Normally conference recess dates are bundled together with the dates of other recesses and tabled earlier in the parliamentary session. In 2018, the recesses for the forthcoming summer, conference, November and Christmas were approved on March 20^th. In 2017, summer and conference went together on June 22^nd (after the general election). In 2016, a whole batch for Easter, Whitsun, the Brexit referendum, summer, conference, November, and Christmas was approved on March 17^th. But this year, on June 24^th, summer recess was tabled alone. On July 18^th, Vaz queried if the House would be sitting throughout September.