In a BBC Newsnight interview that aired in late 2013 and spread widely online in early 2014, Jeremy Paxman put a simple prop in front of James Quincey, then president of Coca-Cola's European business: cinema-sized cups of Coke with the matching amount of sugar piled up next to them. The exchange became one of the best-known moments in the British debate about sugary drinks, and it fed into a campaign that ended with a UK sugar levy a few years later.
What Paxman showed on screen
The segment opened with a question that was being asked loudly at the time: should high-sugar drinks be taxed in a similar way to cigarettes, to help curb rising obesity, and was the soft drinks industry resisting that pressure the way tobacco companies once had?
Paxman's demonstration was about portion size. Reports of the interview describe two cinema cups, roughly half a litre and a full litre, each paired with the sugar it contains: about 23 portions of sugar for the smaller cup and about 44 for the larger. Blogger and obesity doctor Yoni Freedhoff, who wrote about the clip on 28 November 2013, described the amounts as teaspoons. Seeing the sugar as a solid heap makes a number on a label suddenly very concrete.
How James Quincey responded
Quincey's defence was the standard industry one. According to Italian food-safety site Il Fatto Alimentare, he said a regular can contains 35 grams of sugar, about six teaspoons, and compared its calories to a cappuccino or half a croissant. He also stressed that the company's aim was to give people the information to choose, and pointed to Coca-Cola Zero as an alternative.
Faced with the litre cup, though, he gave ground. He accepted that things needed to change and that "bigger cups need to come down", which campaigners quickly quoted as an admission from inside the industry that portion sizes had grown too large.
How much sugar is too much?
The interview makes more sense next to the official guidance that came soon after. In March 2015 the World Health Organization recommended that adults and children keep free sugars below 10% of their daily energy intake, and suggested that going below 5%, roughly 25 grams or six teaspoons a day, would bring extra benefits, mainly for teeth. The WHO noted that a single can of sugar-sweetened soda can contain up to 40 grams of free sugars.
The NHS sets the adult limit at 30 grams of free sugars a day, about seven sugar cubes, with lower limits for children: 24 grams for ages 7 to 10 and 19 grams for ages 4 to 6. It also points out that one can of cola can hold as much as nine cubes, more than an adult's whole daily allowance. Seen against those figures, a litre cup of a full-sugar drink is several days' worth in one film.
What happened next: the UK sugar levy
The pressure on the industry did not fade. The UK government announced the Soft Drinks Industry Levy in the 2016 Budget, and it came into force on 6 April 2018. Producers pay 18p per litre on drinks with more than 5 grams of sugar per 100ml and 24p per litre above 8 grams. Rather than pay, many manufacturers cut the sugar in their recipes. A 2024 Cambridge study found that within 11 months of the levy, daily sugar from soft drinks had fallen by around 3 grams in children and 5 grams in adults. In November 2025 the government announced plans to lower the threshold to 4.5 grams per 100ml and to extend the levy to milkshakes and some coffee and protein drinks.
James Quincey's own career kept rising. He became Coca-Cola's president and chief operating officer in 2015 and succeeded Muhtar Kent as chief executive on 1 May 2017, taking over a company that was trying to sell more low- and no-sugar drinks. The Newsnight clip therefore captures the company's position at an earlier stage of that debate, not its current leadership or policy.
Practical ways to use this
- Check the serving, not just the label. Sugar per 100ml looks small; multiply it by the size of the cup you are actually holding.
- Size down at the cinema. The difference between a small and a large cup in the interview was about 21 portions of sugar.
- Count juice and smoothies too. The NHS counts the sugar in fruit juices and smoothies as free sugar.
- Swap rather than ban. Water, sparkling water or an unsweetened drink most of the time leaves room for an occasional treat.
If you are worried about your weight, blood sugar or a child's diet, talk to a doctor or practice nurse, who can give advice that fits your situation.
Sources: Interview by BBC Newsnight (first shared here via True Activist); Weighty Matters, 28 November 2013; Il Fatto Alimentare, 10 December 2013; WHO sugars guideline, 4 March 2015; NHS: sugar in your diet; Wikipedia: Soft Drinks Industry Levy; FoodNavigator, 9 December 2016.
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