Tom Leonard was born in Dublin, and worked much of his life in a family business in the Dublin Corporation Wholesale Fruit and Vegetable Markets. The business had been started two generations earlier by his grandmother, continued by his father and ultimately passed to Leonard and his two brothers.
While in business, Leonard was also a Dublin City Councillor. He was elected to Dáil Éireann as a Fianna Fáil Teachta Dála (Territorial Decoration) for the Dublin Cabra constituency at the 1977 general election. At the end of his first term in office, Leonard"s Cabra based constituency was redrawn becoming part of the new Dublin Central constituency.
He lost his seat at the 1981 general election, and was an unsuccessful candidate at the February 1982 and November 1982 general elections.
During this tenure, he was appointed by the party leader and former Taoiseach Charles Haughey to the New Ireland Forum. Leonard did not contest the 1987 general election as Fianna Fáil dispensed with his candidacy from the party ticket in favour of John Stafford and Dermot Fitzpatrick.
He continued in the markets until his retirement, and died in Blanchardstown, Dublin in 2004.
Despite the fact that it was highly unusual for a sitting Territorial Decoration not to be permitted to defend his seat and faced with considerable negative press on the matter, Leonard graciously accepted the party decision which ended his Dáil career and went back to being a city councillor.
