apticron uninstallable without cron

Binary package hint: apticron

apticron appears to require cron to be installed so that the /etc/cron.d/ directory exists. When cron isn't installed (as, for example, on a VM built by python-vm-builder), apticron will fail to install.

Presumably, apticron should declare a dependency on cron (or recommend cron and install successfully without it or something).

root@novgorod:~# lsb_release -rd
Description: Ubuntu 9.10
Release: 9.10
root@novgorod:~# apt-cache policy apticron
apticron:
  Installed: 1.1.35
  Candidate: 1.1.35

Running "aptitude install apticron" should install apticron.

Instead, it fails:
root@novgorod:~# aptitude install apticron
[...]
Setting up apticron (1.1.35) ...

Creating config file /etc/cron.d/apticron with new version
cp: cannot create regular file `/etc/cron.d/apticron': No such file or directory
dpkg: error processing apticron (--configure):
 subprocess installed post-installation script returned error exit status 1
Errors were encountered while processing:
 apticron
E: Sub-process /usr/bin/dpkg returned an error code (1)
A package failed to install. Trying to recover:
Setting up apticron (1.1.35) ...

Creating config file /etc/cron.d/apticron with new version
cp: cannot create regular file `/etc/cron.d/apticron': No such file or directory
dpkg: error processing apticron (--configure):
 subprocess installed post-installation script returned error exit status 1
Errors were encountered while processing:
 apticron
Reading package lists... Done