JACOB Rees-Mogg has launched a bizarre defence of a hedge fund manager who has been accused of lobbying the Government for a No-Deal Brexit in order to benefit financially.

In the last few days, Crispin Odey has been forced to deny claims his ardent support of dragging the UK off a cliff edge is motivated by an opportunity to make millions from short-selling British firms and currency.

During a debate in Parliament earlier today, Labour MP Valerie Vaz raised these concerns about the billionaire backer of Boris Johnson who as early as July was allegedly putting pressure on the then-frontrunner to become the next prime minister to prorogue Parliament and force through a No-Deal Brexit.

In response, Rees-Mogg didn’t deny that Odey stood to make money from a No-Deal Brexit. Rather, he pointed to a different hedge fund manager who back in 1992 made more money than Odey stands to make from Brexit.

He said: “One of the major funders, allegedly, of the Remain campaign, the sort of Remoaner funder-in-chief, is one George Soros, who made a billion pounds when sterling crashed out of the Exchange Rate Mechanism, which is five times as much as Mr Odey is said to have made."

The Leader of the House of Commons also felt the need to point out that Odey was a friend and supporter of his: “So I fear all she is saying is that Mr Soros is a better hedge fund manager than my good friend Crispin Odey, who is a great friend of mine and, indeed, supporter of mine.”

In 1992, in the months leading up to a day known as Black Wednesday, Soros sold almost $40 billion ($30bn) in foreign currency through making bets that sterling would be devalued.

On the day, interest rates rose from 10% to 15% in a bid to tempt speculators to purchase the currency, but the move failed spectacularly ruining the then-Tory government’s reputation as the party of economic competency.