What bothers me is the emergence over the last 10 or 15 years is the new London accent that was previously Thames Estaury in the 90s and before that an actual bona fide London accent that my grandparents had.
The new accent is typified by -ah or -ar instead of -er.
The police recruitment adverts being the best example. Become a police office-aah instead of police office-er.
> and before that an actual bona fide London accent that my grandparents had.
It wasn't really, though - it was just the first one you heard. Accents are always in flux.
(An interesting comparison for me is the Sex Pistols' car crash Bill Grundy interview against a modern London yoof accent. Major, major change just within my lifetime).
By bona fide London accent I mean that the way both sets of my grandparents spoke was different to each other in London and different again to their cousins that lived in Kent and Surrey. The Thames Estuary accent pretty much replaced the London accent and those of each of the Home Counties.
Sure, I get it. I'm not trying to be nitpicky (I swear!) I'm just trying to point out that the Elizabethan London accent, the Victorian London accent, and today's London accent are no less bona fide.
Interestingly JRM doesn't have any blue blood at all despite the whole 'honourable member for the early 19th century' persona, public image is a fascinating thing!
Personally my go-to for RP would be Trevor McDonald.