Traits and visibilites

I'm wondering what the visibility rules are for traits:

import java.util.ArrayList

trait T {
  protected val list: MutableList<String>

  public fun doStuff(): Unit {
  list.add(“”)
  }
}

class TUser : T {
  override val list: MutableList<String> = ArrayList()
}

fun main(args: Array<String>) {
  val subject = TUser()
  subject.doStuff()
}


IDE and compiler do not complain about this but it fails at runtime:

Exception in thread “main” java.lang.IllegalAccessError: tfo.kotlin.traits.TUser.getList()Ljava/util/List;
  at tfo.kotlin.traits.T$$TImpl.doStuff(TraitExample.kt:9)
  at tfo.kotlin.traits.TUser.doStuff(TraitExample.kt)
  at tfo.kotlin.traits.TraitsPackage-TraitExample-a18e5d74.main(TraitExample.kt:19)
  at tfo.kotlin.traits.TraitsPackage.main(TraitExample.kt:1)

The runtime error disappears when I change the visibility of the property in class TUser to public. Is this intended behavior or is this a bug? I would argue that TUser inherits from the trait und thus should have access to its protected state/functionality.

I looked into it a little more: that seems to be http://youtrack.jetbrains.com/issue/KT-3029

Are there any plans to address this? That takes away a lot of useful possibilities of traits.