About 30,000 gardaí and second-level teachers now seem likely to have financial sanctions imposed on them by the Government, including a loss of incremental pay rises, from the end of this week.

Minister for Education Richard Bruton yesterday said he considered the Association of Secondary Teachers in Ireland (ASTI) had repudiated the Lansdowne Road agreement by directing members not to carry out 33 additional unpaid hours originally agreed several years ago.

Members of the Garda Representative Association (GRA) also seem likely to forfeit increments after it too rejected the accord.

Financial emergency legislation, known as Fempi, allows the Government to impose sanctions if unions or representative bodies are considered to have repudiated a collective agreement. Gardaí and second-level teachers in the ASTI had signed up to the previous Haddington Road public service accord. It is scheduled to expire tomorrow night.

Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform Paschal Donohoe said payment of incremental rises for public service staff would be confined to members of unions and representative groups inside the Lansdowne Road agreement. He said 288,000 civil and public servants were covered by the agreement.

Mr Donohoe said that the Government did want to engage with unions before the Thursday deadline.

The Department of Justice said it was still open to engagement with the GRA. However the GRA said it would not be re-engaging in talks with the Government until it completed a review of Garda pay and conditions agreed under the Haddington Road agreement but not yet delivered. The GRA said it was not ruling out industrial action.

Meanwhile psychiatric nurses will today start industrial action over staffing levels.