With nothing to lose, goes to the dodgy parts of town (8)
I believe the answer is:
ghettoes
'parts of town' is the definition.
The definition and answer can be both locations as well as being plural nouns.
Perhaps they are linked in a way I don't understand?
'with nothing to lose goes to the dodgy' is the wordplay.
'with' means one lot of letters go next to another.
'nothing' becomes 'O' (O resembles 0).
'to lose' is a deletion indicator.
'dodgy' is an anagram indicator (a dodgy or wrong order of the letters).
'goes'+'to'='goesto'
'goesto' with 'o' taken away is 'gesto'.
'gesto' put next to 'the' is 'gestothe'.
'gestothe' is an anagram of 'GHETTOES'.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Another definition for ghettoes that I've seen is " Poor areas populated by deprived groups".)