versions-maven-plugin display-plugin-updates fails on 3.0-beta-1 while working on 3.0-alph-*

The versions plugin has been working with the alpha releases of maven-3 but the display-plugin-updates goal fails on beta-1. You can create a project with only a pom.xml referencing the versions plugin to demonstrate the failure.

the failure stack is:

[ERROR] Failed to execute goal org.codehaus.mojo:versions-maven-plugin:1.1:display-plugin-updates (default-cli) on project foobar: Execution default-cli of goal org.codehaus.mojo:versions-maven-plugin:1.1:display-plugin-updates failed. NullPointerException -> [Help 1]
org.apache.maven.lifecycle.LifecycleExecutionException: Failed to execute goal org.codehaus.mojo:versions-maven-plugin:1.1:display-plugin-updates (default-cli) on project foobar: Execution default-cli of goal org.codehaus.mojo:versions-maven-plugin:1.1:display-plugin-updates failed.
at org.apache.maven.lifecycle.internal.MojoExecutor.execute(MojoExecutor.java:149)
at org.apache.maven.lifecycle.internal.MojoExecutor.execute(MojoExecutor.java:77)
at org.apache.maven.lifecycle.internal.MojoExecutor.execute(MojoExecutor.java:69)
at org.apache.maven.lifecycle.internal.LifecycleModuleBuilder.buildProject(LifecycleModuleBuilder.java:82)
at org.apache.maven.lifecycle.internal.LifecycleModuleBuilder.buildProject(LifecycleModuleBuilder.java:54)
at org.apache.maven.lifecycle.DefaultLifecycleExecutor.singleThreadedBuild(DefaultLifecycleExecutor.java:218)
at org.apache.maven.lifecycle.DefaultLifecycleExecutor.execute(DefaultLifecycleExecutor.java:190)
at org.apache.maven.DefaultMaven.doExecute(DefaultMaven.java:246)
at org.apache.maven.DefaultMaven.execute(DefaultMaven.java:95)
at org.apache.maven.cli.MavenCli.execute(MavenCli.java:430)
at org.apache.maven.cli.MavenCli.doMain(MavenCli.java:160)
at org.apache.maven.cli.MavenCli.main(MavenCli.java:124)
at sun.reflect.NativeMethodAccessorImpl.invoke0(Native Method)
at sun.reflect.NativeMethodAccessorImpl.invoke(NativeMethodAccessorImpl.java:39)
at sun.reflect.DelegatingMethodAccessorImpl.invoke(DelegatingMethodAccessorImpl.java:25)
at java.lang.reflect.Method.invoke(Method.java:597)
at org.codehaus.plexus.classworlds.launcher.Launcher.launchEnhanced(Launcher.java:290)
at org.codehaus.plexus.classworlds.launcher.Launcher.launch(Launcher.java:230)
at org.codehaus.plexus.classworlds.launcher.Launcher.mainWithExitCode(Launcher.java:409)
at org.codehaus.plexus.classworlds.launcher.Launcher.main(Launcher.java:352)
Caused by: org.apache.maven.plugin.PluginExecutionException: Execution default-cli of goal org.codehaus.mojo:versions-maven-plugin:1.1:display-plugin-updates failed.