[1] He was the son of Margaret (née Fahy) and Patrick Needham; his parents were Irish Catholics and his father was working as a labourer at the time of his birth.

He left school in 1886 at the age of twelve and began working as a trapper boy at a coal mine in Seaham.

In 1888, he and his family moved to Scotland where he worked at a power loom weaving factory in Paisley and at various shipyards on Clydeside.

He remained active in the labour movement and in the same year was elected as a vice-president of the Fremantle branch of the Amalgamated Society of Railway Employees.

[1] Needham supported the short-lived government of Henry Daglish, Western Australia's first ALP premier, which collapsed on a confidence motion after a year.

[1] At the 1933 state election, Needham won the Legislative Assembly seat of Perth on his second attempt, following an unsuccessful candidacy in 1930.

[1] He never held ministerial office, but during his final term was given a seat on the opposition frontbench as a mark of respect.

On the announcement of his retirement, he was described in The West Australian as "a battler for the underdog, easily available to his electors, and never dodging anyone, not even cranks obsessed with hopeless propositions".

[2] Outside of politics he was active in various community organisations, including as a councillor of the Western Australian Industrial School for the Blind, president of the Civilian Maimed and Limbless Association of Western Australia, as a board member of Perth Hospital, and as vice-president of the Australian Advisory Council for the Physically Handicapped.