The French government sought on Wednesday to shrug off an early alert from Brussels about its precarious public finances by promising a sharp slowdown in the growth of public spending over the next four years.

François Fillon, prime minister, tried to play down the tap on the wrist from the European Commission, which fears that France will run up a deficit of 2.9 per cent this year and breach the European Union limit in 2009, describing it as a “message of encouragement” for his economic reform programme.