Nigel Farage has lashed billionaire anti-Brexit campaigner George Soros for vowing to launch a campaign for a second EU referendum 'within days'.

The ex-Ukip leader demanded Mr Soros explain what he thought the June 2016 referendum was actually about given it was the biggest single vote in UK history.

And responding to Mr Soros' claim a new poll would allow the country to decide, Mr Farage blasted: 'We made our mind up, we did it.'

The veteran Brexiteer launched his attack against Mr Soros on his nightly LBC radio show.

Mr Soros funds the Best for Britain anti-Brexit campaign. It plans to publish a manifesto next week on its mission to secure a new vote.

It wants to secure a large mandate to reverse the 2016 referendum on the grounds the negotiation has not secured a good deal for Britain.

Mr Soros revealed the plans yesterday in a speech which admitted the EU faced an 'existential crisis' after a decade of crisis for the Brussels bloc.

Billionaire anti Brexit campaigner George Soros yesterday admitted that the EU is in 'existential crisis' because of its failure to reform (file pic)

Nigel Farage (pictured on his LBC show last night) lashed Mr George Soros for vowing to launch a campaign for a second EU referendum 'within days'.

The business magnate, 87, also warned it could take five years for Britain to fully quit the Brussels bloc because of legal wrangling.

Papers leaked to the Daily Mail last week hinted at the scale of Best for Britain's plans, revealing the group will contradict whatever final agreement Theresa May strikes with Brussels – arguing it is 'not what we voted for'.

The financier suggested the Brexit vote could be reversed and the UK could decide o stay in the EU after all.

In a speech at the European Council on Foreign Relations think-tank event in Paris he said: 'Ultimately, it's up to the British people to decide what they want to do.

'It would be better however if they came to a decision sooner rather than later. That's the goal of an initiative called the 'Best for Britain', which I support.

'Best for Britain fought for, and helped to win, a meaningful parliamentary vote which includes the option of not leaving at all.

'This would be good for Britain but would also render Europe a great service by rescinding Brexit and not creating a hard-to-fill hole in the European budget.

'But the British public must express its support by a convincing margin in order to be taken seriously by Europe.

Who is George Soros and why is he known as the man who broke the Bank of England? George Soros had already made a fortune and a formidable reputation by 1992. But that was when he secured his tag as the 'man who broke the Bank of England'. Short selling US$10billion worth of Sterling during the Black Wednesday crisis made him a reported profit of £1.5billion. The 87-year-old Hungarian-born financier is now one of the world's richest men. His wealth was estimated by Forbes magazine last year at £25billion. Mr Soros has previously warned that Brexit will be a disaster for the economy, and suggested the UK could immediately apply to rejoin the EU. One of Mr Soros's foundations gave the money to Best for Britain, a Remain group that wants to force a second EU referendum. Over the past 40 years he is said to have donated £11billion to philanthropic causes. Advertisement

'That's what the Best for Britain is aiming for by engaging the electorate. It will publish its manifesto in the next few days.'

He added: 'In the meantime, the EU needs to transform itself into an association which nations like Britain would want to join.'

And Mr Soros warned: 'It is no longer a figure of speech to say that Europe is in existential danger; it is the harsh reality.'

Mr Soros' speech came as the EU is facing a fresh crisis as political disarray in Italy casts doubt over its future in the bloc.

Italian President Sergio Mattarella is facing impeachment calls after he defied voters and refused to appoint a fiercely eurosceptic finance minister.

Mr Soros said the EU project has taken a series of blows over the past decade which threaten to derail it altogether.

But he warned of the dangers of Brexit, telling the audience: 'Brexit is an immensely damaging process, harmful to both sides.

'This divorce will be a long process, probably five years, which is an eternity in politics.'

Mr Soros - dubbed the man who broke the Bank of England after he bet against the pound on Black Wednesday - said the EU's reputation has taken a battering in recent years.

He said the financial crisis of 2008 followed by the chaotic response to the huge influx of refugees in 2015 had led many young people to 'regard the EU as an enemy that has deprived them of jobs and a secure and promising future.'

He also said the EU's role in foreign affairs and diplomacy has taken battering after Donald Trump pulled out of the Iran nuclear deal which Brussels had championed.

He said the move by the American President was 'effectively destroying the trans-Atlantic alliance.'

Brexit Secretary David Davis (pictured with EU negotiator Michel Barnier at the March summit in Brussels) is negotiating Britain's departure from the bloc. But George Soros warned that it could take many years of wrangling before Britain fully quits

He added: 'This development will put additional pressure of unpredictable force on an already beleaguered Europe - It's no longer a figure of speech to say Europe is in existential danger.'

Mr Soros also warned that the election of right-wing populist Viktor Orban in Hungary is challenging the very principals the EU was funded on.

He said: 'Viktor Orban based his entire re-election campaign on falsely accusing me of planning to flood Europe, Hungary included, with Muslim refugees.

'He is now posing as the defender of his version of a Christian Europe, that is challenging the values on which the European Union was founded.'

Mr Soros said the EU should try to salvage its project by abandoning the euro and funding a 30 billion euro Marshall Plan for Africa to ease the flow of migrants to the continent.

He said: 'The euro has many unresolved problems and they must not be allowed to destroy the European Union.'