Pronunciations

Don't know, but there are quite few regional differences in Oz too.

Are the differences in England region related or class related?

I suppose there's also educational level differences.

In the case of eg. 'bath', it is down to region and class. On the whole, an northerner (such as myself) would say 'bath' (like 'maths') but a southerner would create an 'r' from somewhere and say 'barth'. There are notherners of the upper classes (again, 'class' or 'clarss') who would introduce the 'r'. Standard 'BBC English' would be the latter.

I am university educated, but am fully aware of the difference in the 'impression of intelligence' it makes when talking to a southerner when us notherners talk the way we do. I can soften my accent considerably if I make a deliberate effort, but refuse to do so generally on the grounds that I am proud to be from up here. There are many more of them then there are of us, so their way is seen as the 'proper' way. As for the Welsh, Scots & Irish, well, who knows?!

I was told by a couple of Aussies I've met over here that there are only really 2 distinct accents in Oz, 'town' and 'country' - is this not the case?

I think there's more than just town and country. When I was in the RAAF, with people from all over the country, there was some lively debate about the 'correct' way to pronounce various words. Country people do tend to talk slower though.

We have a few different accents in Canada -
quebec, acadian and prairie French are all different from french spoken anywhere else and needless to say their english is affected too.
The maritimes give an irish/scottish flair to the tongue.
In onario - central canada- they are persecuted relentlessly for going oot and aboot while driving ferr in there kerr.
We in the west have the decidely least accented language in the english speaking world. We speak the language so plainly it's difficult to pinpoint our origins.
But it's the mispronunciation of the vowels and ignoring the simple rules of grammar that make our language what it is. Wouldn't have it any other way....
Ceili

Hi.
One of the examples, project, is actually two words... homophone?

Pro-ject is a verb meaning to estimate for the future, among other things, or to cause light or shadow to fall onto a surface, i.e., the movie was pro-jected onto the screen...

Proj-ect is a noun; a specific plan or design or a specific undertaking (briefly); thus, the proj-ect is going according to plan...

The wash/warsh thing happens in the U.S. too, but I'm not sure whether it's location or class or what... Both my mom and dad were from the same area of the Midwest, but she washed and he warshed...