He has fought four local government elections (being elected to Leeds City Council in 2004 and re-elected in 2006 as Councillor for Harewood Ward) and unsuccessfully stood in Wakefield at the 2005 General Election. He was Deputy Chairman of Elmet Conservative Association from 2001 to 2004.[5]
In September 2012, Shelbrooke was made the PPS to Mike Penning, Minister of State for Northern Ireland.[7] He announced his delight at taking over the responsibility for "Northern Island" [sic] on Twitter and later blamed the spelling mistake on autocorrect.[8]
In December 2012, Shelbrooke introduced a Ten Minute Rule bill under which UK welfare claimants would be issued with a cash card instead of receiving their benefits in cash. The card would only permit claimants to make purchases such as food, clothing, energy, travel and housing, and prevent them purchasing items considered non-essential, such as cigarettes, alcohol, satellite television, and gambling.[9]
In 2016, Shelbrooke commissioned a report written by Mark McBride-Wright quantifying the impact of homophobia within the engineering industry.[11]
In 2017, he became Vice Chairman (International) of the Conservative Party,[12] a soft-power role designed to promote the UK's interests overseas as well as supporting centre-right political parties in the developing world through the Westminster Foundation for Democracy.[13] Shelbrooke remains an officer of the International Democrat Union. Shelbrooke was an Executive Member of the 1922 Committee during a period of turbulence within the Conservative Party leading to the resignation of Prime Minister Theresa May in 2019.[14] Shelbrooke backed Jeremy Hunt in the 2019 Conservative Party leadership election that followed.[citation needed]
On 7 September 2022, he was appointed Minister of State in the Ministry of Defence as part of the Truss administration because of his overt support for Liz Truss in her leadership campaign. Shelbrooke was then immediately sacked on 26 October 2022 by the new Prime Minister, Rishi Sunak and returned to the back benches.[17][3]