Soft Drink makers in UK plan to take a legal action against the government over its recent announcement to levy sugar tax.
Companies are considering suing the government as one option.

However, before that, they intend to wait and gather more details on the tax that will come into force in 2018 and cost £1bn to implement, which is almost the twice amount that is expected to raise from the tax.

A 24p a litre will be added to the sugar drinks with higher sugar content, which inevitably would be passed on to consumer in the form of higher price, thereby giving rise to inflation.

Chancellor George Osborne has forecasted that the tax will raise £520m in its first year, which is far less than the cost of introducing the levy.

British Soft Drinks Association director general Gavin Partington as quoted by Theguardian.com as saying: "This just reaffirms our view that this tax is ill-considered. The evidence does not suggest it will be effective and taxpayers will be left paying a heavy price for it."

The share prices of major drink manufacturing companies have sharply fallen down after the announcement of sugar tax.

Partington added: "At this stage all options are on the table. We need clarification about how this tax is going to work, exactly what’s excluded and what’s not. Nothing can be ruled out at this stage."

Defending the tax, the government states that the tax was putting the next generation first, and the soft drink manufacturers had time for two years to reduce sugar content.

A HM Treasury spokesperson said: "He [George Osborne] ntroduced a new levy on the soft drinks industry to pay for a doubling of dedicated sport funding for every primary school in the country, a huge expansion of breakfast clubs to ensure that every child gets the best start to the day, and new funding for a longer school day.

"The chancellor also made clear that this was a policy aimed at driving meaningful change. The new levy will not be introduced until 2018, giving companies plenty of time to change product mix and reduce sugar content."