He wants the party to connect better with all types of workers, including the self employed and those on individual contracts, and give greater attention to the changing nature of work.
"Being the party of working people isn't just about being there for New Zealanders who work 9 to 5 on a salary or on a shift for an hourly wage," he said in Auckland this morning, his first major speech since becoming leader 13 days ago.
"It has to be there for all the people who make their own living from their own work."
A team of MPs led by finance spokesman Grant Robertson will spend two years developing a long-term economic plan in the face of the changing nature of work.
It will be called the Future of Work Commission and, with a brief to engage with the public, it will clearly be one of the ways in which Labour will try to reconnect with the New Zealanders after losing support in three successive elections.
"We will work with New Zealanders from the smoko room to the boardroom," said Mr Little, a former head of the Engineering Printing and Manufacturing Union (EPMU).
"Labour is going to spend the next three years focused on solutions, not sitting on the sidelines complaining."
Mr Little said people told him on the last election trail that they did not see themselves in what Labour was saying. They didn't feel anybody was looking out for them.
"Today I have a clear message about that: to people working hard to get a small business off the ground, to people choosing to work on contract, people who are their own bosses, and are thinking about maybe being able to take on someone else - we get it.
"And the Labour Party will work for you."
Mr Little gave his speech to a breakfast audience of about 100 unionists, party activists, business and community leaders arranged by the Chamber of Commerce chief executive Michael Barnett.
Mr Robertson, Deputy leader Annette King and a handful of MPs attended, as did unionists Robert Reid and Jill Ovens, Auckland councillors George Wood and Dick Quax, former MP John Tamihere and former Auckland mayor Dick Hubbard.
Mr Little said the Labour Party had a challenge to update its definition of working people in a world where the nature of work itself was changing.
His own son, Cam, was aged 13 and it was obvious the workforce he was going to enter would be totally different from the one he entered as a lawyer for the EPMU.
"New technology is rapidly transforming our world and our work. It's hard to understate just how important these changes are going to be for working people."
One study last year showed that 47 per cent of all jobs in the US were at high risk from automation.
At the same time, more people, especially younger people embraced the new economy and were working to make their own ideas succeed.
"We need a Government that is going to champion those people while fighting to make sure that no one is left out or left behind by an economy that is changing in ways we could never have predicted."
Mr Little said "the social contract" was breaking down - the contract of the Government setting good rules to ensure certainty and fair rewards, with the knowledge there would be support if you needed it.
And it was not just a problem for the low paid.
"More and more people on good incomes, mid-level incomes, are finding it harder to save, harder to pay the mortgage, harder to keep their businesses afloat, harder to get ahead.
"People are feeling the squeeze even though they are working their guts out."
He wasn't blaming just the current Government for "this new era of squeeze and insecurity", he said.
It was caused by the fundamental settings of the economy.
It was about the fact that too much investment capital was going into speculation instead of the next great Kiwi business that would create jobs.
"It's about the fact that the average house in Auckland earned more money last year than the average worker."
- Audrey Young of the New Zealand Herald
