The Garda Representative Association has announced that its 10,500 members are withdrawing co-operation with the Department of Justice's 'transformation agenda' as part of its dispute over pay.
The move is a response to the Government's imposition of a freeze on increments because the GRA has rejected the Lansdowne Road Agreement on public sector pay.
However, GRA President Ciarán O'Neill said the withdrawal of co-operation would not have a major impact on the public.
Meanwhile, the Government has appointed industrial relations specialist and former Labour Court chairman John Horgan to chair the stalled review of garda pay and industrial relations.
Meanwhile, issues involving pay arrangements for newly qualified teachers are to be examined following agreement between officials from two Government departments and the two teacher unions inside the Lansdowne Road Agreement.
Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform Paschal Donohoe told the Dáil this afternoon that there was agreement yesterday to "fully scope out the issues".
Mr Donohoe was responding to a question from Sinn Féin TD David Cullinane who told the Dáil that the minister has no plan for public servants beyond the LRA.
Mr Donohoe said the Government has a plan that has been accepted by 23 public sector unions and 280,000 public servants and he will continue to engage with unions, who are inside the LRA, "on issues of concern to them".
Mr Cullinane also asked Minister Donohoe about plans to unwind FEMPI, the emergency financial measure that underpins public service pay reductions.
The minister said the Programme for Government outlines that the future of FEMPI legislation has to be one that is based on negotiation with the trade union movement and the ability of the State to afford it.
He said that "all of this is in the context of the Lansdowne Road Agreement, a collective agreement that at the moment is giving wage increases to those members that are part of it."
AAA/People Before Profit TD Richard Boyd Barrett has labelled the low pay levels experienced by newly qualified teachers as "pay apartheid."
Also during Ministers' Questions, he asked Mr Donohoe: "What are you concretely going to do, and how can you justify the sort of pay apartheid that would mean somebody who happens to come in after 2012, who will over the course of their 40 years working earn €250,000 less than somebody who happened to come in in the years before that?
"How can you justify that?"
Mr Donohoe said that we had an employer, the State, whose resources and ability to hire people was very badly affected because of the crisis that we were in at that point.
He said employees were taken on in changed circumstances. He pointed out that the Lansdowne Road Agreement puts in place ways in which unions can deal with the Government.
He said progress has been made in relation to firefighters and "meetings took place yesterday in relation to the INTO and the TUI on that very issue. Now we will see, how and if, we can work with the unions on that matter."
He said an immediate reversal of the FEMPI legislation would be €2.2bn to the State and he cannot reconcile that figure with the need to fund other public services the House want him to deliver.
Mr Boyd Barrett said a lot of teachers have no incentive to get increased qualifications because most of the cut imposed on new teachers was on the area of allowances, linked to qualifications.
"Not only have you imposed an unfair 'pay apartheid', but you are also undermining the quality of education particularly to vulnerable children in our education system."
Social Democrats TD Róisín Shortall said the State is no longer in an emergency situation as it was when the FEMPI legislation came in and therefore there is a strong case for pay restoration and there is a potential for legal action.
She pointed out that a lot of young teachers are now heading off to Dubai and Abu Dhabi to try to get money together so that they can live in Dublin.
Mr Donohoe said he is acting in a manner consistent with legal advice received.
He said he "does not want wage increases today that the State finds out it cannot afford in the future and that becomes the savage wage cut of the future."
AAA/People Before Profit TD Ruth Coppinger has also told the Dáil that in a 40-year career, a teacher qualified after 2012 will face a loss of €250,000 compared to when she started out teaching.
She asked Mr Donohoe: "Do you think that is justified? The starting salary for a teacher is now €8,500 less than it was a few years ago.
"That is a 20% cut. You are maintaining that in this agreement and the reason that the ASTI and others have not signed up is that they are not willing any longer to go into the staff room and look younger teachers in the eye, when some teachers are earning higher pay and other people are not."
She added: "the media is very found of saying that the unions sold out young teachers. Well, here is a union taking a stand now against not selling out young teachers and they are being blackguarded as a result."
Mr Donohoe said there is nobody being blackguarded by this Government and he has always recognised the right of people to be outside of collective agreements and the democratic right they have to ballot any agreement that is put to them and it is up to them if they want to be party to it or not.
He pointed out that Minister for Education Richard Bruton has said he wants to engage with the ASTI in relation to Lansdowne Road and other issues that are of concern to them.
Mr Donohoe said that he has to respect those that are inside the agreement.
