THE High Court has agreed to hear a landmark challenge to the controversial super profits mining tax, posing a fresh threat to the government's embattled revenue base.

Chief Justice Robert French ruled on Monday that the court's full bench will hear the case - brought by West Australian mining magnate Andrew Forrest's Fortescue Metals Group - next year.

Starting as early as March, the case sets the scene for a fresh showdown between the Gillard government and the billionaire miner, who launched the action in June.

The mining tax is forecast to raise $9.1 billion over four years, including $2 billion this financial year. But it reportedly produced nothing in the September quarter, and Deloitte Access Economics forecasts it will yield no more than a net $500 million this financial year.