Apparently Liverpool council is proposing to use its powers to upgrade to an 18-certificate the classification of films "if they depict images of tobacco smoking". The move is a bid to protect the city's vulnerable youth from exposure to the temptations of the evil weed.

I believe that a far more effective solution is for Hollywood to simply ban smoking in movies. Naturally, old movies tend to depict smoking. One assumes that those actors who smoked heavily on-screen also did so off-screen.

Humphrey Bogart always had a cigarette in his hand in all his films. Somehow it went hand in hand with the raincoat and battered trilby. In his case the cigarette seemed like a natural extension to his hand. He died of throat cancer at 57.

Bette Davis was always smoking in old movies (lung cancer, 81) even smoking on the Terry Wogan show in 1987 a couple of years before her death. "I’ve been close to Bette Davis for 38 years," quipped Henry Fonda once, "and I have the cigarette burns to prove it." Sammy Davis' stage act was always accompanied by cigarettes (throat cancer, 64). Audrey Hepburn was seen smoking  – very elegantly, admittedly, in an iconic pose with a cigarette holder in Breakfast at Tiffany's – (cancer, 64) as did her co-star George Peppard (cancer-related death, 65).

Needless to say, some of the biggest stars of the day all smoked heavily: Clark Gable, Gary Cooper, John Wayne, Errol Flynn, Robert Taylor, Bette Grable, Steve McQueen, Yul Brynner, Lee Marvin and Spencer Tracy. None made really old bones. Notable (very) premature deaths from lung cancer in the UK were Stanley Baker (48) and Mike Pratt – from TV series Randall and Hopkirk Deceased – (45).  

The good news is that quitting smoking – before it's too late – can still lead to a long life. Film stars like Ernest Borgnine and Kirk Douglas (both 92 years young) and Lauren Bacall (84) quit smoking and are still alive today as a result.

But, to be fair, most of these aforementioned stars belonged to an era when they could be forgiven for not realising the perils of smoking. But nowadays stars have less excuse. Yet Sharon Stone was seen puffing away in THE famous scene in Basic Instinct, as was Uma Thurman in Pulp Fiction.

Other famous smokers, according to the internet at any rate, are Scarlett Johansson, Kirsten Dunst, Natalie Portman, Naomi Watts, Gwyneth Paltrow, Kate Winslet, Charlize Theron, Matt Damon, Viggo Mortensen, Johnny Depp, Ben Affleck, the late Heath Ledger and Sean Penn (even smoking on interviews with Larry King). I can't recall if all these stars have smoked on film but they should desist from so doing.

I once interviewed singer Dionne Warwick and actor Ben Cross and both declined to be photographed smoking – i.e. they were smokers who didn't wish to publicise it. Other famous smokers, please take note!!