Error on missing Python module in Meson setup

When setting up a postgres tree with Meson on an almost empty Debian 11 VM I
hit an error on "meson setup -Ddebug=true build ." like this:

Program python3 found: YES (/usr/bin/python3)
meson.build:987:2: ERROR: Unknown method "dependency" in object.

The error in itself isn't terribly self-explanatory. According to the log the
error was a missing Python package:

Traceback (most recent call last):
File "<string>", line 20, in <module>
File "<string>", line 8, in links_against_libpython
ModuleNotFoundError: No module named ‘distutils.core'

Installing the distutils package fixes it, but it seems harsh to fail setup on
a missing package. Would something like the attached make sense?

--
Daniel Gustafsson https://vmware.com/