Listen to the clips at the foot of this page to hear how Gordon Brown's accent has changed

THE rolling growl of Gordon Brown’s Kirkcaldy youth has been jettisoned on the path to Downing Street. Expert analysis of his changing accent over the past 30 years has shown the influence of life in England and a need to appeal to its voters.

Dominic Watt, a forensic voice scientist at Aberdeen University, has compared recordings of Brown in 1975 with more recent speeches.

The chancellor no longer uses the distinctive rolled Scottish “r” – and his vowels no longer sound like the short, sharp diction of the 1980s comedy character, C U Jimmy, played by Russ Abbott.

Watt has found that Brown’s accent now makes use of the so-called labiodental r”, which is strongly associated with estuary English and is closer to the lisped “w” sound synonymous with the BBC presenter Jonathan Ross.

Watt, who has been used by police forces to identify criminals by their accents, said the sound was absent from the 1975 recording of Brown, but had cropped up in words such as “draft”, “strive” and “rise” in a speech he gave after it was confirmed he would be the new Labour leader on May 17.

Labiodental r – produced after consonants such as b and p and before rounded vowels such as “oo” and “aw” – is a common feature of estuary English, although not unique to it. “This kind of r-less speech is found around the Thames estuary and more generally. Harry Enfield’s Loadsamoney had it, and George Orwell refers to it in his novel Keep the Aspidistra Flying where a character has ‘an r-less Nancy voice’ and talks about ‘poetwy’,” said Watt.

“It’s spread in England among young people but in Scotland it’s still regarded as a speech defect. It’s not common in Scotsmen in their fifties, even ones who have lived in London for donkey’s years.”

Watt said Brown had also lengthened his vowels over time, moving away from trademark short Scottish vowels to more typical received pronunciation.

In 1975, Watt said Brown shortened the vowel in the word “students” but now elongated it, perhaps making his speech easier to understand for English listeners.

“There is a difference between some of the vowels that Brown is using in the later clips. There is something called the Scottish vowel length rule which is a feature of Scottish English that makes it very different from other varieties round the world.

“When people hear Scottish people saying words like ‘rude’ they comment that it sounds funny. The vowel is very much shorter. In received pronunciation you have one short and one long vowel in the words seat and seed but in Scottish English the vowel is short in both.”

A spokesman for Brown said he had not received voice coaching.

Sounds different

I’m Gordon Brown

1975 Ah’m Girrrdn Brrn
2007 Eye ahm G-oh-don Bw-oww-n

Prudence for a purpose

1975 prroodns frra a prrpus
2007 pw-ooo-dens fow a puh-pus

Tony’s removal van

1975 T’nees r’moovl vn
2007 T-oh-nee’s ri-moo-vul van

See You, Jimmy

1975 See-yoo-jmi
2007 See-eh yooo, ji-ih-me

How Brown's voice has changed over 30 years

Audio clip 1

In this clip from 1975, a young Gordon Brown peppers his speech with trademark short Scottish vowels as he discusses his role as the rector of Edinburgh University.

The best word to listen for is “student”, which occurs at 8, 15, 18, and 37 seconds. The short vowel also occurs in “people” at 40 and 47 seconds.

Brown’s now vanished habit of rolling his Rs can also be heard at the start of “rector” at 10 and 16 seconds, “represented” at 19 seconds and “representative” at 46 seconds.

Audio clip 2

By 2007, as these clips shows, Brown has taken to speaking in the manner of Jonathan Ross. His rolling Rs have given way to the letter “w” which means he refers to people hit by a “cwisis” instead of “crisis” and “pwoblems” rather than “problems” while risks become “wisks”. Other oddities are “welevant” and “degwee”, secretary “Wubin” and Mr “Gweenspan”.

Audio clip 3

In this final selection of clips from 1975 and 2007 there is a dramatic change from the use of Scottish sounding short vowels in words like Peter Ustinov and student to the elongated vowels he uses today in words like "people", "lead" and "streets"

— The 1975 excerpt is from a Scottish Television interview.

— The 2007 clips are from BBC interviews.

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