Carl Cashman knows you fancy him – but he’d rather you kept your d**k pics to yourself (EXCLUSIVE)
Cashman has been dubbed the UK’s sexiest politician. And I think he knows it, admitting “about 90 per cent of my Instagram followers are gay men”
Carl Cashman isn’t too phased by the number of dick pics he receives, but he’s asking his more rabid fans to rein it in a bit.
“By all means, look at my pictures, but that doesn’t mean I want to look at your pictures,” he says. Most of the thirsty messages he gets are “in jest; you can see the fun side of it,” he says, but “some of it… not so much”.
Although sending unsolicited nudes is a crime, luckily for the gays, fancying Cashman is a completely harmless – and understandable – activity. As he sits across from me in a Westminster office, his face framed by tousled hair and a square jaw, his muscles bulging under his blue suit, I’m aware that half of Vauxhall would swim across the Thames just to trade places with me. Because Cashman, 34, has been dubbed the UK’s sexiest politician. And I think he knows it, admitting “about 90 per cent of my Instagram followers are gay men”.
“I think I might be the only straight person who’s a trustee!” – Carl Cashman on his work with Sahir House, Liverpool’s oldest LGBTQ+ and HIV charity
The leader of the Liberal Democrats on Liverpool City Council has amassed over 87,000 followers on the platform, and it’s not just his good looks or to-camera videos about local planning policy that have magnetised the gays. He’s a self-professed ally, having publicly worn a “Protect the Dolls” T-shirt, vocally supported gay and trans rights and worked with Sahir House, Liverpool’s oldest LGBTQ+ and HIV charity (“I think I might be the only straight person who’s a trustee!”).
Cashman may have won over many hearts, eyes and, er, other organs in the gay community, but how do his politics measure up? Does he walk the walk as well as talk the talk at what is a fractious time for LGBTQ+ rights?
Born in 1991 in Prescot, “just outside Liverpool – my friends would call me a ‘plastic scouser’”, to young parents, Cashman was raised by his grandparents. His was a firmly working-class childhood – his gran worked in a fish and chip shop, his granddad did “odd jobs” and home was “a prefab council house”.
He had just left Higher Side Community Comprehensive, a “very rough school”, when “I got swept up in the whole Cleggmania thing,” door-knocking for the party and soon meeting Iain Smith, then MSP for North East Fife and one of just four out politicians in the Scottish Parliament. “He was this massive, towering fella, and he taught me everything I know about campaigning and became like another father figure to me.”
“I actually don’t agree with a lot of the stuff that was done during that period” – Cashman on the Lib Dem-Conservative coalition
Cashman wasn’t too pleased with Lib Dem politics during the five-year-long Lib Dem-Conservative coalition era, which began in 2010. “I actually don’t agree with a lot of the stuff that was done during that period,” he explains, adding, “the one thing that that election made me realise, through watching Clegg and reading the manifesto, was that I was a liberal.”
Within a year of graduating with his degree in politics and philosophy from the University of Liverpool, Cashman was elected into his first council role in Knowsley, a side hustle to his job as a mortgage broker.
To him, liberalism means “that you should see the individual before you see the group, and that everyone is capable of doing something amazing with their lives. What they just need is the tools to do that.”
He cites a preamble from the Lib Dems’ constitution: “Nobody should be enslaved by poverty, ignorance, or conformity.”
And the Lib Dems certainly don’t conform – not even to each other. In 2018, then-leader Tim Farron wavered on his statement that gay sex is not a sin, behaviour Cashman calls “so stupid… He couldn’t give a straight answer on it!”
“I never pretend to know exactly what [LGBTQ+] people are experiencing” – Cashman
In contrast, Cashman’s approach is “a really kind of a liberal idea of – as long as that person’s not impacting your life, let them live the life that they feel is authentically theirs.
“The beauty of the world is the fact that everyone’s an individual, everyone’s different. I’ve had gay friends as long as I can remember. They’re some of the most amazing people.
“I never pretend to know exactly what [LGBTQ+] people are experiencing. I can advocate for them from an external point of view, though. And I think people see this gym-bro type thing in me, and me having gay friends and being involved in an LGBTQ charity really helps to bridge that gap.”
It’s not just gay rights where the Lib Dems have wavered. Trans rights are a point of friction too. Several – but not all – Lib Dem MPs have signed an Early Day Motion for Parliament to reject the Equality and Human Rights Commission’s new draft guidance following the Supreme Court ruling that for the purposes of the Equality Act 2010, “sex” strictly means biological sex. Meanwhile, Liberal Voice for Women, a Liberal Democrat group formed to “ensure that women’s sex-based rights, representation, and voices are fully respected within our party”, has called the guidance “a pragmatic, and proportionate framework that helps protect everyone’s rights”. Where does Cashman stand?
“They’re one group in the party that is very out of sync with the general party’s views,” he says. “As a liberal, you’ve got to allow those voices; you should have a debate on topics that people feel strongly about.”
However, he adds that the debate around trans people’s existence in certain public spaces has left him “flabbergasted, really, by people’s villainisation of the trans community, because trans people have always existed. Trans people deserve our love and support.”
This is an excerpt from a feature appearing in issue 371 of Attitude magazine, on sale in print and digital on 3 July. Pre-order Attitude magazine issue 371 in print now, or in digital on the links below on Apple News+ and the Attitude app.