Bug#139328: apt-get fails to parse /var/lib/dpkg/status

[Jason Wood <jasonwood@blueyonder.co.uk>]

Package: apt
Version: 0.5.4

After a recent update, apt-get fails on any operation with the following 
error:

Reading Package Lists... Error!
E: Unable to parse package file /var/lib/dpkg/status (1)
E: The package lists or status file could not be parsed or opened.

I have provided my current (broken) status file (gzipped) here :

http://www.uchian.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/apt-problems/status.gz

And I have provided the last working status file here :

http://www.uchian.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/apt-problems/dpkg.status.2.gz

And the diff between the two files here :

http://www.uchian.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/apt-problems/diff

The diff between the two files is only 90 lines long :-) so hopefully this 
will be of help for tracking down the problem.

-- 
Jason Wood
Persistence is a virtue