i also thought about that, and in the past i have tried several techniques. i found that it all seems to be too much work. i'm now using:

my $version_pod = <<'=cut';
=pod

=head1 NAME

Foo.:Bar - blah

=head1 VERSION

$VERSION = "0.71"

=cut
our $VERSION = "0.71";
...
sub __test_version {
    my $v = __PACKAGE__->VERSION;
    return 1 if $version_pod =~ m/VERSION.*\Q$v/;
    return;
}
[download]

and then i have a test that calls the __test_version() method.
this way i have to type the version twice, but hey, that's ok. the point is, i can't forget it as my testsuite would fail.

additionally, Test::Pod fails with your hack. =)