Oded Regev presented it as a lord visiting Faraday's lab and viewing his induction devices:

lord: It all looks very nice, but what is its use?
Faraday: I don't know, but you surely can collect much taxes over it.

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There's also lord Reay who spoke about the usefulness of Fullerenes in front of the House of Lords in October 1991, remind me to bring the exact quotation next week.