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Cummings is, I think, (unsurprisingly) wrong about the constitution: if there is a vote of no confidence in say September and an election is not fixed till after Halloween, the purdah convention would require Johnson to seek an extension until after Election Day.
But since there is doubt about the enforceability of that convention, and since Cummings/Johnson have contempt for conventions that don’t suit them, it would be foolish to rely on it.
MPs seeking to stop no deal should therefore be prepared to rally round an alternative PM: if Johnson loses a vote of no confidence he can then be told that if he refuses to extend, a majority of MPs will then back an alternative PM, whom the Queen would then have to appoint.
That is the only reliable way of dealing with a government that rejects normal constraints: it has to be ejected.
(See here for my analysis of the purdah or “don’t preempt” convention and the reasons why - unlike @RobertCraig3 - I don’t think the contrary view is even arguably correct.)
