Brexit talks should last just 15 months, European Union leaders tell Theresa May

Davis told Reuters that his talks with Weber, whose group is the biggest in the parliament, and with the legislature’s own Brexit negotiator Guy Verhofstadt had focused on discussing the process for negotiations and not the substance of future talks.

Although formal negotiations can not begin until the Article 50 notification, which Theresa May has pledged will happen before the end of March, Mr Davis said the pair had discussed the structure of the process.

Davis described his meeting with Verhofstadt as “great fun” and denied having compared the MEP to Satan.

British Brexit minister David Davis met the EU’s chief negotiator Michel Barnier on Monday, the first meeting of several that Britain hopes will “lay the ground for a constructive dialogue”.

Senior figures in the European Parliament warned Britain on Tuesday that it can not “cherry pick” from members of the European Union, after Brexit minister David Davis met senior EU negotiators for talks on Britain’s forthcoming exit from the bloc.

“That will be part of the work that we do in terms of the negotiation that we are undertaking with the European Union”, she added.

Stepping in with more funding means the government may have gone some way to alleviate concerns that United Kingdom technology research would dwindle if leaves the European Union. Businesses ready to make the best of BrexitMr Drechsler said that businesses were 100 per cent committed to making the best of Brexit and, in partnership with government, would help ensure a smooth exit from the European Union in 2019.

But a transitional deal that did not involve some form of extension of so-called Article 50 divorce talks, which May has said will start by the end of March and last two years, would not offer enough legal certainty for banks. “I ask the British government not to influence this discussion, which will go on over the next two, two and half years”, he said. “No, what I’ve always said is that we want to look at ways in which we can improve corporate governance, looking at a number of areas, including workers’ representation on boards”.

Theresa May’s “zero plans” for Brexit will drive Scotland towards a second independence referendum, says a leading economist.

One of the key factors behind the Brexit vote was the influx of hundreds of thousands of citizens from other European Union states into Britain every year to find work.

Mr Verhofstadt said it would be a “tough period, very intense”.

Tory MPs will be determined that the process is resolved by the time of the 2020 general election, with the risk that Brexit could be unpicked by a new Government.

The European parliament would have the power to veto any eventual Brexit deal, so ensuring a good relationship with its leaders is vital to making a success of Brexit.