Ben Leo used GB Dads to explain why is GB News off air today for viewers expecting the new series, and he did it by speaking openly about the father figures in his own life. He said he has not seen his father since he was 10 years old, then described Mike as the man who stepped in after that loss.
“I haven't seen my dad, my father, since I was 10, when my mum kicked him out,” Leo said during the series. He added: “And when my dad left, he kind of became my surrogate father.”
Ben Leo and Mike
Leo said a lodger called Mike lived with the family for years. He said Mike “had been in the house for maybe 20 years, just living in a spare room, working and so on,” and that he later became the father figure Leo did not have at home.
That role ended badly. Leo said Mike died of cancer, and that he carried Mike’s coffin when he was 16, at the funeral. He also said: “So I didn't really have a male role model growing up.”
GB Dads on GB News YouTube
The disclosure came as part of GB Dads, a new video series featuring Leo, Patrick Christys and Martin Daubney. GB News said the first episode would be on the GB News YouTube channel from 12am Saturday 8th August, turning Leo’s childhood account into the centre of the launch rather than a side note.
For viewers, the practical point is simple: the series starts at midnight on Saturday 8th August, and Leo’s contribution is framed around fatherhood rather than studio chat. The personal detail also explains why his on-air discussion has resonated: he lost one father figure at 10, then lost the replacement figure before adulthood.
Atlanta and the World Cup
Leo was reporting from Atlanta ahead of the World Cup match when he opened up about his childhood during GB Dads. The sequence matters because it shows the revelation was not a retrospective interview promoted weeks later; it came alongside his live reporting duties and into a series built around family experience.
The unresolved question is what prompted him to talk about this history in that moment beyond the launch itself. The answer may sit in the next episode, but the first chapter is already clear: a presenter known for live reporting used a fatherhood series to say he grew up without a consistent male role model, then traced that absence back to two losses that shaped him long before GB Dads existed.
