A GB News commentator, a TikTok star and an owner of a haulage business are among those competing on a new Channel 4 show that will see them follow the dangerous journeys that asylum seekers make to get to the UK.
Six British people with strong positive and negative views on immigration are taking part in Go Back To Where You Came From, based on an Australian show of the same name that began in 2011, which will see them kick off their travels in the unstable cities of Mogadishu in Somalia and Raqqa in Syria.
The cast includes Dave Marshall, a chef turned TikTok star from Nottingham; GB News regular Chloe Dobbs, originally from Cornwall, and now living in London, and Nathan, who owns a haulage business in Barnsley, Yorkshire.
For Dave, who says he formed his views against anti-illegal immigration from seeing his mother speak about hardship faced by people in the UK while working for the Citizens Advice Bureau, this is one of the few trips abroad by the 35-year-old, who did not have a passport until he was 30.
He said he had thought the Channel 4 series “was a bit of a scam at first”, before seeing it as a “chance for me to see the other side of things, to see where these people come from and how they live, so for me it was to learn”.
He called the experience “quite scary, up until the point when I started talking to locals and they were dead nice”.
Yorkshire father of one, Nathan, says his work running a haulage business made him concerned with immigration as he would face fines for lorry stowaways, and this could “bankrupt me – I could lose my house, my business, everything”.
Following taking part in the programme, he said that he was “outraged at kids” living in bad conditions in Mogadishu.
“My son’s biggest worry is whether he’s got enough coins to buy stuff in his games,” the 32-year-old added.
“The kids we met were literally fighting to survive.”
Chloe, who owns a paddleboarding business, and graduated from Oxford University with a degree in Politics, Philosophy and Economics, says she was “gobsmacked by the poverty in Syria”.
“We were in the Kurdish part, north of Syria, in that area it seemed like it was relatively safe for civilians, but people were still fleeing because the poverty was off the scale,” she added.
“The poverty was so shocking, I think it struck a chord with all of us who were there.”
Also in the show is Jess, who lives in a small village in Carmarthenshire, Wales, and protested against a hotel at Stradey Park Hotel in Llanelli which had been set to be turned into housing for asylum seekers, London journalist, podcaster and refugee camps volunteer Mathilda Mallinson, and sociopolitical commentator Bushra Shaikh, whose parents are first generation immigrants from Pakistan.
After being on the show, Shaikh said: “I learned that there’s a lot of ignorance in the world, most of which stems from lack of education and resources.
“We need to learn from each other. Before I began the journey, I assumed most people would know about Islam – but they don’t. It showed me that we all need to take a step back and try to understand where others are coming from.”
Go Back to Where You Came From will air on Channel 4 in February 2025.
