diff --git a/DESCRIPTION b/DESCRIPTION
index ad94618..e98b0c9 100644
--- a/DESCRIPTION
+++ b/DESCRIPTION
@@ -1,12 +1,14 @@
 Type: Package
 Package: audit.base
 Title: Base package for Posit Checks
-Version: 0.7.3
+Version: 0.7.4
 Authors@R:
     person("Jumping", "Rivers", , "info@jumpingrivers.com", role = c("aut", "cre"))
 Description: Base package for sharing classes between posit audit
     packages. Unlikely to be useful as is.
 License: file LICENSE
+Depends:
+    R (>= 4.1.0)
 Imports:
     cli,
     dplyr,
@@ -14,6 +16,7 @@ Imports:
     gt,
     htmltools,
     httr,
+    jsonlite,
     processx,
     purrr,
     R6,
@@ -24,7 +27,6 @@ Imports:
     tibble,
     yaml
 Suggests:
-    jsonlite,
     rvest,
     testthat (>= 3.0.0)
 Remotes:
diff --git a/NAMESPACE b/NAMESPACE
index 6f5a2f7..3e76fd4 100644
--- a/NAMESPACE
+++ b/NAMESPACE
@@ -25,4 +25,5 @@ export(print_colour_versions)
 export(update_all_versions)
 import(R6)
 importFrom(dplyr,"%>%")
+importFrom(rlang,"%||%")
 importFrom(rlang,.data)
diff --git a/NEWS.md b/NEWS.md
index 908906d..192094f 100644
--- a/NEWS.md
+++ b/NEWS.md
@@ -1,3 +1,6 @@
+# audit.base 0.7.4 _2026-10-16_
+  * fix: `get_uv_python_versions()` works before R 4.4, as `%||%` is imported from rlang. DESCRIPTION requires R 4.1.0 and imports jsonlite (#61)
+
 # audit.base 0.7.3 _2026-10-15_
   * fix: A release newer than the version list is reported as newer than the list, not as past EOL (#55)
   * fix: Versions are compared as numbers, so Quarto 1.10 counts as newer than 1.9
diff --git a/R/get_latest_versions_remote.R b/R/get_latest_versions_remote.R
index 750dd40..1ef17de 100644
--- a/R/get_latest_versions_remote.R
+++ b/R/get_latest_versions_remote.R
@@ -36,10 +36,6 @@ get_latest_versions_remote = function() {
 }
 
 get_latest_versions_from_posit = function(type = c("r", "python")) {
-  if (!requireNamespace("jsonlite")) {
-    cli::cli_alert_info("Missing package - jsonlite")
-    return(invisible(NULL))
-  }
   type = match.arg(type)
   url = glue::glue("https://cdn.posit.co/{type}/versions.json")
   versions = unlist(jsonlite::read_json(url))
diff --git a/R/import-from.R b/R/import-from.R
index 4654213..c56141c 100644
--- a/R/import-from.R
+++ b/R/import-from.R
@@ -1,4 +1,4 @@
-#' @importFrom rlang .data
+#' @importFrom rlang .data %||%
 NULL
 
 #' @importFrom dplyr %>%