Eighteen months.
That's the timeframe Conservative MP David Davis has given himself to fulfill his mandate in his new role as UK Secretary of State for Leaving the European Union.
Appointed to the specially-formed ministerial position by UK Prime Minister Theresa May on Wednesday evening, the 'Leave' campaigner had already sketched a plan for what he hopes will be a "brisk but measured" Brexit.
Writing for ConservativeHome, he was eager to put a positive spin on the June referendum result, arguing that "Brexit gives us many tools to deal with the very serious economic challenges that the country will face in the coming decades."
Then, he did wear the European nickname "Monsieur Non" as something of a badge of honour. So best be getting on with it.
His proposed approach would "involve concluding consultations and laying out the detailed plans in the next few months."
For Davis, the "ideal outcome" from negotiations is continued tariff-free access to the market without "budging" on border controls. The sentiment in Europe is that this is a non-runner.
Trade deals with individual nations would also be arranged.
Davis wrote:
"Be under no doubt: we can do deals with our trading partners, and we can do them quickly. I would expect the new Prime Minister on September 9th to immediately trigger a large round of global trade deals with all our most favoured trade partners.
"I would expect that the negotiation phase of most of them to be concluded within between 12 and 24 months.
"So within two years, before the negotiation with the EU is likely to be complete, and therefore before anything material has changed, we can negotiate a free trade area massively larger than the EU.
"Trade deals with the US and China alone will give us a trade area almost twice the size of the EU, and of course we will also be seeking deals with Hong Kong, Canada, Australia, India, Japan, the UAE, Indonesia – and many others."
The Independent has subsequently noted that the Brexit Secretary was unaware that individual EU members could not negotiate trade deals on their own as recently as May.
The paper reports him as saying on May 26th:
“Post Brexit a UK-German deal would include free access for their cars and industrial goods, in exchange for a deal on everything else,” he said on 26 May this year.
“Similar deals would be reached with other key EU nations. France would want to protect £3 billion of food and wine exports. Italy, its £1 billion fashion exports. Poland its £3 billion manufacturing exports.”
Another snag – the British civil service currently has no trade negotiators.
Speaking to BBC Radio 4, former head of the UK government’s EU unit Oliver Letwin said:
“The trade negotiators who are Brits at the moment are basically working for the EU.”
