Filename completion broken on single quote

[lolilolicon]

Inside an empty directory:

  touch 1 1\'1
  complete -r ls
  ls 1\'<TAB>       # ls 1\'1
  complete -f ls
  ls 1\'<TAB>       # ls 1
  ls 1\\\'<TAB>     # ls 1\'1

(Note: the comment on the right is the result after pressing <TAB>)

Is this broken behavior?
Why on earth does the user have to double-escape at all?
Is there any benefit of this?

This is the version I use:
GNU bash, version 4.2.10(2)-release (i686-pc-linux-gnu)