Cannot execute basic commit function

In a previous life I used baxaar and was sad to hear that the project was dormant. I successfully installed the breezy package in WinPython 3.10 I tried to add and commit a small text file and got an internal error. Transcript follows below:

D:\sample\trunk>brz commit -m "Added firsat line of text"
Committing to: D:/sample/trunk/
brz: ERROR: TypeError: can only concatenate str (not "bytes") to str

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "C:\WPy64-31050\python-3.10.5.amd64\lib\site-packages\breezy\commands.py", line 1036, in exception_to_return_code
    return the_callable(*args, **kwargs)
  File "C:\WPy64-31050\python-3.10.5.amd64\lib\site-packages\breezy\commands.py", line 1228, in run_bzr
    ret = run(*run_argv)
  File "C:\WPy64-31050\python-3.10.5.amd64\lib\site-packages\breezy\commands.py", line 779, in run_argv_aliases
    return self.run(**all_cmd_args)
  File "C:\WPy64-31050\python-3.10.5.amd64\lib\site-packages\breezy\commands.py", line 804, in run
    return class_run(*args, **kwargs)
  File "C:\WPy64-31050\python-3.10.5.amd64\lib\site-packages\breezy\builtins.py", line 3763, in run
    tree.commit(message_callback=get_message,
  File "C:\WPy64-31050\python-3.10.5.amd64\lib\site-packages\breezy\bzr\workingtree_4.py", line 241, in commit
    result = WorkingTree.commit(self, message, revprops, *args,
  File "C:\WPy64-31050\python-3.10.5.amd64\lib\site-packages\breezy\mutabletree.py", line 122, in commit
    committed_id = commit.Commit().commit(working_tree=self,
  File "C:\WPy64-31050\python-3.10.5.amd64\lib\site-packages\breezy\commit.py", line 410, in commit
    self._update_builder_with_changes()
  File "C:\WPy64-31050\python-3.10.5.amd64\lib\site-packages\breezy\commit.py", line 666, in _update_builder_with_changes
    for path, fs_hash in self.builder.record_iter_changes(
  File "C:\WPy64-31050\python-3.10.5.amd64\lib\site-packages\breezy\bzr\vf_repository.py", line 387, in record_iter_changes
    for change in iter_changes:
  File "C:\WPy64-31050\python-3.10.5.amd64\lib\site-packages\breezy\commit.py", line 683, in _filter_iter_changes
    for change in iter_changes:
  File "breezy\bzr\_dirstate_helpers_pyx.pyx", line 1441, in breezy.bzr._dirstate_helpers_pyx.ProcessEntryC.__next__
  File "breezy\bzr\_dirstate_helpers_pyx.pyx", line 1589, in breezy.bzr._dirstate_helpers_pyx.ProcessEntryC._iter_next
  File "C:\WPy64-31050\python-3.10.5.amd64\lib\site-packages\breezy\osutils.py", line 1752, in _walkdirs_utf8
    dirblock = sorted(read_dir(relroot, top))
  File "breezy\_walkdirs_win32.pyx", line 250, in breezy._walkdirs_win32.Win32ReadDir.read_dir
TypeError: can only concatenate str (not "bytes") to str

brz 3.3.2 on python 3.10.5 (Windows-10-10.0.19044-SP0)
arguments: ['C:\\WPy64-31050\\python-3.10.5.amd64\\Scripts\\brz', 'commit',
    '-m', 'Added firsat line of text']
plugins: bash_completion[3.3.2], changelog_merge[3.3.2],
    commitfromnews[3.3.2], cvs[3.3.2], darcs[3.3.2], email[3.3.2],
    fastimport[3.3.2], flake8[unknown], fossil[3.3.2], github[3.3.2],
    gitlab[3.3.2], hg[3.3.2], launchpad[3.3.2], mtn[3.3.2],
    netrc_credential_store[3.3.2], news_merge[3.3.2], po_merge[3.3.2],
    propose[3.3.2], pypi[3.3.2], quilt[unknown], repodebug[3.3.2],
    rewrite[unknown], stats[3.3.2], svn[3.3.2], upload[3.3.2],
    weave_fmt[3.3.2], webdav[3.3.2], zsh_completion[3.3.2]
encoding: 'cp1252', fsenc: 'utf-8', lang: None

*** Breezy has encountered an internal error. This probably indicates a
    bug in Breezy. You can help us fix it by filing a bug report at
        https://bugs.launchpad.net/brz/+filebug
    including this traceback and a description of the problem.

Any suggestions would be appreciated. Is there any a priori reason why it should not work?