Zac Goldsmith

I can't be bought. I don't need to be bought. I'm not a careerist. I don't need to have a career in politics. I'm in a very, very luxurious position, but I am in a position of strength.

I wanted to weave a green thread through the Conservative party; that's my job, and I signed up imagining that I would be in a very small minority within my party, possibly even on my own, battling away on these issues.

All schools should teach children basic cooking skills. Every school should be able to buy sustainable, good quality food wherever possible from local sources. Every school should include food-growing in the curriculum. For some, that will mean twinning with willing farms. For others, it will mean literally building their own small farms.

More than half the world's largest 100 economies are corporations. They have no loyalties to place or citizens.

If we want to preserve Heathrow's hub status, we need to stop clogging it up with point-to-point flights to places such as Cyprus and Greece, which between them account for 87 weekly flights, and contribute nothing to overall connectivity.

More passengers fly in and out of London than any other city in the world. We are well-connected, we have ample capacity, and we are starting from a position of strength. The problem is that we don't use that capacity well.

We always hear from newspapers that while people understand the environmental challenge, they are unwilling to stomach the solutions. The trouble is, we only ever hear about the solutions from the media, and for whatever reason, they are almost always caricatured beyond recognition. If there's no appetite for green, it's not surprising.

Leonardo DiCaprio is a rare phenomenon. Whereas for so many celebrities an interest in the environment is a fashionable accessory, for DiCaprio it is a thread that runs through everything he does.

Green' cannot be allowed to become an excuse for stealth taxes. And nor should 'green taxes' be about punishment. Instead, they should represent a switch of emphasis. So if domestic flights are taxed, it should be on the absolute condition that the money is ploughed into improving the alternatives, such as trains.

Even Karaoke needs higher standards than I can reach, so I have gone great lengths to avoid being bullied into it.

Europe believes that providing clear labelling for genetically modified food is a consumer right, but such practice is absolutely opposed by the vast majority of states in the U.S.

I am cynical about politicians. My experience of politicians has been thoroughly negative. I have found that politicians are people that can not be taken at face value. There are very few politicians I have been impressed with.