diff --git a/src/PythonQt.cpp b/src/PythonQt.cpp
index c6fdef4..f6721a8 100644
--- a/src/PythonQt.cpp
+++ b/src/PythonQt.cpp
@@ -1146,7 +1146,7 @@ void PythonQtPrivate::registerCPPClass(const char* typeName, const char* parentT
 PyObject* PythonQtPrivate::packageByName(const char* name)
 {
   if (name==NULL || name[0]==0) {
-    return _pythonQtModule;
+    name = "private";
   }
   PyObject* v = _packages.value(name);
   if (!v) {
diff --git a/src/PythonQt.h b/src/PythonQt.h
index 1f39302..1e98d92 100644
--- a/src/PythonQt.h
+++ b/src/PythonQt.h
@@ -479,6 +479,9 @@ public:
   //! called by virtual overloads when a python return value can not be converted to the required Qt type
   void handleVirtualOverloadReturnError(const char* signature, const PythonQtMethodInfo* methodInfo, PyObject* result);
   
+  //! get access to the PythonQt module
+  PythonQtObjectPtr pythonQtModule() const { return _pythonQtModule; }
+
 private:
   //! Setup the shared library suffixes by getting them from the "imp" module.
   void setupSharedLibrarySuffixes();