The UK only entered the Common Market less than 50 years ago. We only entered the Single Market in 1993. That should hardly be a long time ago for the civil service. It's not as if we have to re-invent everything from scratch! (Though having said that I do remember there being some fuss over innovative headgear for Sikh police officers - as if the British had no history whatsoever of Sikh police at any point.)
On a related note, the current negotiations appear to be a complete shambles, shuffling from one weak position to the next. If you want to negotiate you negotiate from a position of strength, and the only position of strength for the UK would be a firm understanding of what a hard brexit would mean - a study of which the civil service singularly appears to have failed to undertake. To paraphrase: prepare for the worst. By planning for a hard brexit the UK would already be on the way to finding innovative solutions instead of continually being mentally wedded to the Single Market, which will only lead to a poor deal for the UK.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
