Kim Rubenstein, independent Senate candidate for the ACT, officially launched her campaign at Aspen Island on Sunday.

The Australian Electoral Commission formally confirmed her Kim for Canberra Party as a political party three weeks ago. She will be the first Independent senate candidate to appear above the line on the ballot paper in the ACT at the next election.

More than 500 Canberrans attended the event, organisers say. They described it as “the realisation of the groundswell of support that the party has experienced” since Professor Rubinstein announced in August she would run for politics.

Professor Rubinstein is one of Australia’s foremost constitutional and citizenship law experts, and one of the Financial Review’s ‘100 Women of Influence’.

Her major policies are integrity in parliament, climate change, safety in the workplace, and the direct representation of Canberrans.

Structures and cultures that held up virtues of parliamentary system were being slowly chipped away, Professor Rubenstein said; the planet was under threat from rising temperatures; and the threat to women’s safety highlighted the need to move to an equal and just society, with equal representation of gender and the diversity of Australian society in all sectors.

Professor Rubenstein spoke of her desire to “do politics differently”, starting with a level of community engagement and active listening that she said the major parties seemed to have neglected over the last three years.

“The voices of the people are at the epicentre of our democracy, and the major parties over time have increasingly muffled and muted this voice,” she said.

“This voice has been ever increasingly disconnected from the halls of parliament, the very halls that are meant to represent the will and be responsive to the needs of the people…

“I want to directly represent all your voices in the Senate, so that politics can once again be a collaborative process within the Australian community – to make this country better for all.”

The Kim for Canberra party will gradually release comprehensive policy documents outlining how to achieve these focus points in the lead up to the 2022 federal election.