My interest in film is sort of catholic - apart from science fiction and horror movies, I'll watch almost everything.

If you didn't have patents, no one would bother to spend money on research and development. But with patents, if someone has a good idea and a competitor can't copy it, then that competitor will have to think of their own way of doing it. So then, instead of just one innovator, you have two or three people trying to do something in a new way.

You need a stubborn belief in an idea in order to see it realised.

Design and technology should be the subject where mathematical brainboxes and science whizzkids turn their bright ideas into useful products.

I've obviously used fans - I wouldn't say all my life, because we couldn't afford them when I was young, but from my 20s and onwards we've had to use fans. And I've always loathed them. Everything about them. The way you adjust them, getting them at the angle you want. Carrying them. Cleaning them. The danger of putting your finger in them.

I think people are realizing that engineering and science are extremely good degrees to get and you'll be very highly paid once you've got them.

The media thinks that you have to make science sexy and concentrate on themes such as rivalry and the human issues.