Commander, I in no way wish to standardise the way in which we speak English, the accent in Cornwall or Northumberland is fine but if you asked the use the Cludgy in Somerset you may find you have s**t yourself before the locals understood what you meant. Nor would I expect to eat English food in the middle of the Indian Ocean any more than I would want a song written in Gaelic to be translated into English. However when I go to Barnsley or Hull I would expect to be able to understand the locals as they ostensibly speak the same language as I do. In my experience, which is quite varied having lived in many places around England, people who persist in speaking in a dialect tend to be those of limited intelligence. A broad brush perhaps but nonetheless true. As I have stated previously, there is nothing wrong in having an accent but to "communicate" in dialect is small minded, parochial and isolationist.