Coca-Cola threatened to cut investment in Britain if Philip Hammond pressed ahead with plans for a sugar tax, the Telegraph can reveal.

Documents seen by this newspaper show that, during the Chancellor's first week in office, the soft drinks giant privately warned that amid the "uncertainty" caused by the Brexit vote the levy risked "our ability to maintain our investment in our UK operations".

A coalition of industry trade bodies issued a separate warning to the Prime Minister that business "confidence" was "fragile" in the wake of the European referendum.

The Food and Drink Federation (FDF) claimed that the Treasury's experts should be "100 per cent focused on the future of the customs union".