Promoted to full admiral on 9 November 1805, Pole was present at the funeral of Lord Nelson in January 1806. He became a Lord Commissioner of the Admiralty on the Admiralty Board led by Viscount Howick in February 1806. He was also elected Member of Parliament for Plymouth in November 1806. However he stood down as a Lord Commissioner when the Second Portland Ministry took power in March 1807: in Parliament he became increasingly critical of the new Government particularly in relation to their handling of the raid on Copenhagen in 1807 (which led to the Anglo-Russian War) and the Convention of Sintra in 1808 (which allowed the French to evacuate their troops from Portugal).