SmokeFree movies
Film ‘stars’ are launching a campaign in Liverpool to get smoking out of youth-rated movies.
Youth campaigners wearing giant papier mache heads depicting characters from the movies, such as The Joker from Batman and Captain Jack Sparrow from Pirates of the Caribbean, will be touring the city over the summer to draw attention to the campaign.
“It’s an eye-catching way of making the point that the movies have a huge influence on young people taking up smoking,” said Eilidh McCluskie, programme manager for youth group D-MYST.
“Liverpool City Council is consulting on the issue of whether to use local powers to rate movies which show smoking as adult-only. We think this would be a simple and really effective way of protecting young people, and will be asking Liverpool people to give us their support,” she added.
The City Council is inviting comments on the proposal, which will be considered formally later in the year. If it goes ahead, Liverpool will be the first city in the country to use its powers in this way.
“We are fully committed to this action,” said Gideon Ben-Tovim, Chair of Liverpool Primary Care Trust and
Joint Chair of SmokeFree Liverpool Stakeholder Group. “Smoking is one of the major health issues in this city, and anything that can be done to help stop young people starting the habit is to be welcomed.”
Researchers estimate that 2,700 city under-18s are currently smoking because of the influence of movies.
“We know that around half the people who start to smoke will die prematurely because of the habit – so the lives of something like 1300 young people in this city will be blighted because of the movies. This is clearly unacceptable – and simply tackled,” he added.
“We have been asking the British Board of Film Classification to use its powers on this issue, without success, so we must now hope that the City Council will hear the evidence and take its own action.”
The City Council will be inviting public comment on the proposal, after August 10, on www.liverpool.gov.uk/smokinginfilms
