The Financial Times, the world's most respected business newspaper, speculated this week that Malta's draft budget will be rejected by the European Commission, perhaps as part of a sweetener for France, which is said to be facing a very real prospect of its draft budget being rejected by Brussels.

Last Wednesday's deadline for the EU's 28 countries to submit their budgets opens up a two-week window during which France and a few other countries who know they have missed key deficit targets must wait and hope for leniency, or be forced into reworking their figures.

According to the Financial Times, the European Commission is expected to reject the French budget and send it back to Paris for more work.

But, according to the newspaper, in an effort to show it is not singling out Paris, Commission officials are considering adding three other countries to the reject list: Malta, Italy and Slovenia.

The EU has until the end of the month to review and, if necessary, return the budgets for revision, in line with the agreement on budget reviews designed to prevent member states building up huge debts of the kind that plunged the region into a debt crisis five years ago.

This week, EU Economics Commissioner Jyrki Katainen suggested that it was necessary to hold France and other countries accountable for their budgets.

"Our common economic governance framework is a sign of our responsibility to each other," he said. "It is the Commission's job to ensure that this framework is upheld and that all member states are treated equally. It is a question of fairness and credibility."