Shane Rattenbury and Rebecca Vassarotti have been elected the Parliamentary Leader and Deputy Parliamentary Leader of the ACT Greens, in what the party says is Australia’s first ballot of members to determine parliamentary leaders.

Mr Rattenbury was the only candidate for leader.

Ms Vassarotti said she was privileged to be chosen. Emma Davidson and backbenchers Jo Clay and Laura Nuttall also stood for deputy leader.

Last year, a spokesperson said, the ACT Greens became the only state and territory-level political party in Australia to offer one-member-one-vote leadership elections, moving the decision out of the Legislative Assembly party room into members’ hands. Mr Rattenbury said it was “a terrific exercise in democracy for our party”.

“Grassroots democracy is all about including people in the decisions that affect them,” ACT Greens co-convenor Julie Randall said. “That’s what we want to normalise for all Canberrans. This leadership ballot is one of many ways that we Greens walk the talk.

“It’s exciting for us as a party, but it’s actually exciting for the entire ACT community who’ve never had a chance to choose the leaders of a political party before.”

Mr Rattenbury said this grassroots democratic participation was a great model for Canberra. “What we conducted in our own party is how we want to do politics in the ACT: we want people to have an opportunity to have a direct say, to be involved in the decisions that affect them, and to have a voice in decisions that matter to our city.”

Mr Rattenbury said the ACT Greens now go into the election confident their team is experienced, capable, and has ideas to change “the systems that fuel the housing, climate and inequality crises, to relieve cost of living impacts, and make Canberra an even better place to live”.