A leading academic thinks he has found the explanation for the Australian accent - alcohol.

Dean Frenkel, a communications expert at Victoria University in Melbourne, believes that early British settlers who arrived in the county got drunk every day, causing them to slur their words.

This affectation on the way they spoke then became common and passed on to people born in the country, giving birth to the distinctive Aussie tones, according to Mr Frenkel.

He explained in Australian newspaper The Age: “The Australian alphabet cocktail was spiked by alcohol.

“Our forefathers regularly got drunk together and through their frequent interactions unknowingly added an alcoholic slur to our national speech patterns.

“For the past two centuries, from generation to generation, drunken Aussie-speak continues to be taught by sober parents to their children.”

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The academic’s hypothesis may prove to offensive to native Australians, but Mr Frenkel is absolutely convinced his theory is accurate.

He added: “The average Australian speaks to just two thirds capacity - with one third of our articulator muscles always sedentary as if lying on the couch; and that’s just concerning articulation.

‘Missing consonants can include missing “t”s (Impordant), “l”s (Austraya) and “s”s (yesh), while many of our vowels are lazily transformed into other vowels, especially “a”s to “e”s (stending) and “i”s (New South Wyles) and “i”s to “oi”s (noight).”

Clearly not caring about causing any offence, Mr Frenkel called on Aussies to “take our beer goggles off”.

It has previously been suggested that the Australian accent is an accurate reflection of how British arrivals from the 18th and 19th century actually spoke.

Pics: Rex