THERE ARE questions political parties are shying away from, either because they are judged too controversial or too complex.

They aren’t complicated. But they are vote-winners or losers.

So: does Wales want to allow outright devastation of the uniquely precious Cambrian mountains wilderness by submitting to increasingly aggressive proposals for more than 100 very big wind-turbines, towering steel pylons and oceans of concrete - just in order that vast amounts of Wales-generated electricity already being exported to England, Ireland and Europe can be added to?

Additionally, would the country in any case be content to permit a procession of private companies, with the slavish consent of the present Cardiff government, to make a mint off the backs of numerous communities in rural Wales, in a process reminiscent of Wales’s gross exploitation over water exports?

Latest Welsh government figures show Wales does not need a single new wind-turbine in order to meet its own electricity needs.

The country currently generates about 24 terawatts (TWh) of electricity but uses only about 15 TWh. The surplus is exported to other parts of the UK, to Ireland and to Europe.

About 8 TWh of the 24TWh total is from renewables, the rest from fossil gas, particularly from two large plants at Pembroke and Connah’s Quay.

Wind companies, mindful of their profits, and piling pressure on rural communities and government to surrender to their rapacious schemes, ignore these inconvenient truths.

With only slightly more than half Wales-generated electricity used in Wales, there is not a scrap of justification for succumbing to renewables industry pressure to green-light environmentally catastrophic ambitions to erect more than 100 gigantic turbines in the Cambrian mountains.

The big surplus represented by what Wales generates and what it uses means there is not the slightest need to rush ahead with new turbines. Any increased Welsh demand for electricity could very easily be met by the excess.

Meanwhile, there must be an unrushed public debate about whether Wales is willing to sacrifice prime landscape merely, for example, to enable people outside Wales to continue immersing themselves in video-games and plying each other with pictures of Fido on the beach and what they had for Sunday lunch. Always remembering that England has itself long ago rejected further turbine-building.

Huge tensions persist over the dramatic profit-driven acceleration in the number of windfarms proposed for these mountains, which are a universe in their own right, running parallel to, and insulated from, the world of multiple insanities beyond. They must remain sacrosanct.

In February, the Welsh government awarded contractual guarantees for five onshore windfarms, 12 solar and three tidal-energy projects, impervious to informed counter-argument about consequent serious damage to the natural environment and loss of badly needed food-production land.

Sucking up to the renewables industry, economy, energy and planning secretary Rebecca Evans said she knew “how important clarity and certainty are for developers, which is why we are working hard to speed up the planning process for major infrastructure projects.”

Where was her rationale for allowing vandalising of wilderness in order to accord with industry theorising cobbled together in a failed attempt to justify forecasts of “economic opportunities” and carbon-reduction targets? Be aware that this fast fading government rejects any need for such niceties.

With a new government there is the ideal moment to turn away from threatened environmental vandalism and to think long and hard about electricity-generation and usage, about energy-saving and about safeguarding green tourism.

One question demanding an answer is whether a Plaid Cymru government would cut loose from current Labour government complicity with Westminster energy secretary Ed Miliband, who has successfully persuaded Cardiff to go full steam ahead on the turbines England has refused.

ELECTION pamphlets have never been so crammed with pictures of candidates. Portraits of cheery people evidently propelled by dynamism and ambition push words to the margins. What these Senedd hopefuls dread is not being recognised in the street.

But there’s more to it than that.

I’m told they’re driven by a determination to derive best value from cross-party investment in a new cutting-edge Chinese digital device - the Grippatron, designed to record the number of handshakes endured by candidates during street-level vote-catching excursions.

Party managers think the data obtained will be important in designing future election strategies. But perhaps they just like digital knick-knacks.

Grippatrons (£49.99 from tech outlets) look like a slim version of a standard wrist blood-pressure monitor but worn out of sight on the upper arm, with wifi controls that slot on to wrist-watches and offer a surge of hand/wrist strength if the wearer feels crushed.

The theory is that candidate-recognition is maximised by inserting lots of photographs of would-be SMs into polling pamphlets. Grippatron data, the thinking goes, should show whether that’s correct, and therefore whether future elections communications should be more, or less, bulging with candidate snaps.

The O’Brien household has heard from all the main Ceredigion Penfro parties and, in the picture stakes, Labour and Conservatives jointly lead, with 22 depictions each of their top-of-the-list candidates - respectively, current first minister Eluned Morgan and Tory leading lights Paul Davies and Samuel Kurtz. Opinion-polls backing Plaid Cymru and Reform could be all wrong.

Second is Lib-Dem Sandra Jervis, from Lampeter, with 16 sizeable pictures splashed across four leaflets, followed by Elin Jones, Plaid’s lead, who sports a creditable 13 pix. The Green Party takes a small-is-beautiful approach, with just two shots of top candidate Amy Nicholass.

Reform UK’s offering nearly didn’t get opened, appearing as it did in a plain white envelope I thought might be from the bank. Its single sheet includes two pictures of Wales leader Dan Thomas and deputy leader Helen Jenner, but not a single word from either. An enclosed letter signed by Nigel Farage may suggest the candidates are being managed from Clacton. Or NewYork. Or Washington.

ELUNED Morgan’s in a tangle.

Number one on Labour’s list of seven candidates for the Ceredigion Penfro constituency, she will, if elected, have committed to representing the interests of the entire population of this new, overlarge, culturally mismatched entity.

That’s the official position following the 2026 review of Senedd constituencies. Eluned seems to disagree. Her election pamphlet says she is “seeking election in May, to represent the community I call home - St Davids.” A map with the cathedral town circled in red and the word “Home”, also in red, is provided. Inferring that anywhere north, south or east of St Davids is for her an outer wilderness, well beyond her encampment.

She says the current Mid and West Wales region “will be reconfigured into a series of new constituencies, including Preseli Ceredigion, where I am seeking election in May…”

Ahem… There is no Preseli Ceredigion constituency. There’s Ceredigion Preseli, but that’s a Westminster entity held by Plaid’s Ben Lake, where there is no expectation of polling before 2028 or 2029.

All of this suggests Eluned may need to put her feet up. On one of the Lords’ comfy red benches.