Just looked at the thread 'Careers Advice For Children' and it reminded me of my experience of the carrers advisor I went to on leaving school.
I lived in Bath at the time and I had a strong somerset accent. Still do, if and when I go home. The career advisor asked me what I wanted to do. I said I was moving to Leicester and I had applied to the GPO to become a telephonist. The rotten sod laughed and said 'My dear you have no chance, your education and speech is by far too poor'.
Well I thought my dear dad was going to explode. He jumped up and said "Thank you for your time, we are off now we have important things to do", "Good day madam". Off we trotted.
I got the job, because I learnt how to 'loose' the accent and to this day I mix and match it to the environment I am in. So I guess I am saying there is no need to loose your accent but there is an intelligent reason for being able to adapt to, dare I say it 'Queen's English'. It's a matter of being able to have the social skill to adapt, nothing more, nothing less.
Having said that I don't think accents are seen as a problem other than if you have to commumicate for work purposes. You only have to listen to the t.v. to know things have changed, quite right too. Oh dear have I just made a vote for then a vote against.