The Commonwealth election of 2001 was one of the most remarkable of Australian elections.

A Government, seemingly on the ropes just months from polling day, is comfortably re-elected. Unusually, major factors in its victory are immigration and international terrorism issues. Soon after the election the merits of the result come into question due to revelations about its response to those issues, and in particular the accuracy of the 'children overboard' affair. This research paper describes the election, analyses the result and gives a full set of figures.