Ed Miliband is failing to connect with voters, New Statesman says It came as Mr Miliband faced fresh criticism after announcing a shake up of his senior team with just six months to go before the General Election. There were reports last night that David Axelrod, a former adviser to President Obama hired by Labour to advise on the election campaign, will also be visiting the UK imminently to bolster Mr Miliband. Jason Cowley, the editor of the New Statesman, said: "Miliband is very much an old-style Hampstead socialist. He doesn't really understand the lower middle class or material aspiration. He doesn't understand Essex Man or Woman. Politics for him must seem at times like an extended PPE seminar: elevated talk about political economy and good society. He contrasted Mr Miliband's "narrow" background with that of Margaret Thatcher, the daughter of a grocer and Alan Johnson, the former health secretary and postman. He said: "Miliband does not have a compelling personal story to tell the electorate, as Thatcher did about her remarkable journey from the grocer's shop in Grantham and the values that sustained her along the way or Alan Johnson does about the rise from an impoverished childhood in West London. I went to Oxford to study PPE, worked for Gordon Brown, became a cabinet minister and then leader of the party does not quite do it. None of this would matter were Miliband in manner and approach not soo much the product of this narrow background. He said that Mr Miliband "seldom seems optimistic" about Britain, instead "speaking too often of struggle and failure, of people as victims." "It's true that life is difficult for many," he said. But a nation also wants to feel good about itself, and to know in which direction it is moving. Mr Miliband moved to bolster his position by appointing Lucy Powell, who managed his leadership campaign, as Vice Chair of the General Election campaign. Labour last night denied that the move reflected concerns about the party's poll ratings or represented a demotion for Douglas Alexander, Labour's election campaign chief. The mini-reshuffle followed the decision by Jim Murphy, the former shadow international development minister, to stand as leader of the Scottish labour party. He has been replaced by Mary Creagh, the former shadow transport secretary, whose role has been filled by Michael Dugher, previously shadow minister for the cabinet office. Mrs Powell has also taken Mr Dugher's former post a shadow cabinet minister