Getting an error from dpkg when Update Manager is trying to do regular updates

[xff]

Binary package hint: dpkg

When trying to download and install updates with update manager, after it downloads and attempts to install it throws up an error. It says:

   Extracting templates from packages: 100%
   Preconfiguring packages...
   (reading database ... 50%dpkg: unrecoverable fatal error, aborting:
     files list file for package 'python-serial' is missing final newline
   E: Sub-process /usr/bin/dpkg returned error code (2)
   A package failed to install. Trying to recover:

it then does nothing else. I would really like to know how to get past this, as there are important security updates i'd like to take care of.

I am using Ubuntu 9.10: Karmic Koala
as for my version of dpkg the output of apt-cache policy dpkg is:

   dpkg:
     Installed: 1.15.4ubuntu2
     Candidate: 1.15.4ubuntu2
     Version table:
    *** 1.15.4ubuntu2 0
           500 http://us.archive.ubuntu.com karmic/main Packages
           100 /var/lib/dpkg/status

ProblemType: Bug
Architecture: amd64
Date: Fri Feb 26 08:55:56 2010
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 9.10
NonfreeKernelModules: nvidia
Package: dpkg 1.15.4ubuntu2
ProcEnviron:
 LANG=en_US.UTF-8
 SHELL=/bin/bash
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 2.6.31-19.56-generic
SourcePackage: dpkg
Uname: Linux 2.6.31-19-generic x86_64

[Jean-Baptiste Lallement (jibel)]

Thank you for taking the time to report this bug and helping to make Ubuntu better. This particular bug has already been reported and is a duplicate of bug 108189, so it is being marked as such. Please look at the other bug report to see if there is any missing information that you can provide, or to see if there is a workaround for the bug. Additionally, any further discussion regarding the bug should occur in the other report. Please continue to report any other bugs you may find.