It is the exception rather than the rule to find a gross yield above 5 per cent – most produce less.Investors who are seeking income from their shares will no doubt be disappointed, as they can generally secure higher returns from simple savings accounts.Naturally everyone needs a contingency level of savings which provide instant access.It is also true that higher returns can be obtained from notice or fixed- term accounts. However, maximising short-term returns with savings accounts can be to the detriment of future income.It is essential for every investor to have a comfort level of savings.It is equally important for those who will be relying on investment income to consider taking steps to ensure that their income increases over time, even if this means forgoing income in the early years.This may not be a route that everyone is able, or indeed would wish, to take. It requires planning and professional guidance.Ideally, in addition to funds in instant access and term accounts, consideration should be given to securing a guaranteed level of income.This may be achieved by investing in gilts, which are Government securities. These were the subject of this column last month when it was explained that when the current price for a dated gilt is more than pounds 100, it means that the investor will make a loss when the security is redeemed.Although such gilts pay a high dividend, it must be understood that a proportion of the income paid every year is effectively capital.When investing for income, the advice is usually that 40 to 50 per cent of a portfolio should be in securities producing a fixed level of income.If contemplating investing in gilts, professional advice should be sought from a stockbroker or independent financial adviser (IFA).However, ordinary gilts do not give protection against inflation.

An alternative course would be to invest in a fixed interest unit trust.John Hutton-Attenborough, of IFA Berry Birch & Noble, says it may be worth contemplating the Commercial Union Income Unit Trust which currently yields an income of 7.6 per cent.This need not be to the detriment of the invested capital. Over the past 12 months, a pounds 1,000 investment would now be worth pounds 1,177 if dividends had been invested. Over five years pounds 1,000 would have risen to pounds 1,780, which is an annual growth rate of 12.2 per cent.In effect, the fund has grown by a considerable amount more than the amount paid in income over the years.So as to spread the risk, any shares portfolio should contain at least six holdings spread across different sectors.In order to absorb the cost of buying and selling the shares, the minimum economic holding per share is around pounds 2,000.This may not be affordable by more modest investors. However, there is a solution – unit trusts which invest in a mixture of fixed income stocks and shares.Mr Hutton-Attenborough says the Jupiter Income Unit Trust is well worth considering. With income reinvested, the return over the past year has been 21.6 per cent and an annual equivalent of 27.5 per cent over the past five years.However, the dividend yield is only 3.7 per cent. This means that pounds 1,000 invested a year ago would have produced an income of just pounds 37.At the same time, pounds 1,000 invested five years ago would now produce an annual income of pounds 124.51, which is equivalent of 12.45 per cent gross.This emphasises the fact that that when investing in the stock market for income, one should take a longer-term view and be willing to sacrifice a low initial income for higher dividends later.Readers contemplating investing in the stock market for income are recommended to seek professional advice.. The Government has hushed up the threatened resignation of a senior minister in charge of a flagship policy, amid political infighting involving Peter Mandelson, the Minister without Portfolio.

Ian McCartney, Minister of State at the Department of Trade and Industry, who is in charge of Labour’s radical plans for a national minimum wage, offered his resignation to Margaret Beckett, President of the Board of Trade, two weeks ago, according to fellow MPs and sources within the DTI.
Friends of Mr McCartney, a tough Scot dedicated to pushing through the policy – a legacy of the late John Smith – say he was infuriated by attempts from above and from Mr Mandelson to water down the measure. His exasperation boiled over on 24 November, virtually the eve of publication of the Government’s Bill to enact the national pay plan. Westminster sources say he submitted a letter of resignation to Mrs Beckett, but sympathetic ministers – including Chancellor Gordon Brown and the Culture Secretary Chris Smith – rallied round Mr McCartney and he kept his job.Last night, Mr McCartney formally denied offering his resignation, as a minister would in such circumstances He said: “It is a complete fallacy. I have never resigned from anything in my life, although on occasion I have been sacked from a few jobs!”The son of a former Labour MP in Glasgow, he was a TGWU shop steward and full-time party worker before entering the House in 1987 as MP for the safe seat of Makerfield, Lancs. Aged 46, he is one of a small number of MPs from the traditional wing of the party who have been given substantial jobs in the Blair administration.The row brings into the open simmering discontent over the role of Mr Mandelson, who irritated many MPs during the Labour Party conference with his suggestion that the minimum wage would not apply to young people, and that there might be other exemptions. Mr McCartney has fought a fierce battle to minimise exemptions, and angrily ruled out regional variations in the Commons on 20 November – four days before his threatened resignation.Controversy has dogged the national minimum wage since it became Labour policy. In one incident, nurse Sam Bell was threatened with a gun by a patient as he tried to collect him from his home.

Next week Frank Davies, chairman of the Health and Safety Commission, will present Frank Dobson, the Health Secretary, with new plans for counteracting the tide of violence against health professionals. The HSE said nurses were now five times more likely than the average worker to be the victims of such violence. Security and protective services workers, including police officers and doormen, were considerably less vulnerable, with 25 per cent of workers being attacked.
Next in the line of fire were social and care workers (21 per cent) and teachers and other education staff (14 per cent).The HSE study showed that one in 12 of all female workers has now been the victim of violence by a member of the public, and one in 16 men. For some workers the violence is a regular occurrence, with 10 per cent of those workers who had been attacked saying it had happened at least five times in the past year.The possibility of being threatened with violence is now almost commonplace in many British workplaces. Some 18 per cent of females had been threatened along with 15 per cent of male workers. Again, nurses were most at risk, with 48 per cent saying they had been threatened.Health chiefs are alarmed. Nursing is now officially the most dangerous profession in Britain, when it comes to dealing with members of the public, writes Ian Burrell.

New research by the Health and Safety Executive reveals that 34 per cent of nurses have been attacked while doing their jobs. And delegates are working on schemes whereby dirty countries could buy the right to pollute from the cleaner ones or finance clean-up measures abroad.Mr Prescott said that Britain was determined “to keep up the momentum” at the summits next year and added: “Tony Blair’s effort has been very considerable, and he is at the very heart of this agreement.”He is playing an important part in bringing about this most important convention, and in seeing it implemented.”El Nino effects spread, p14. But he believed that a treaty would be agreed.He said: “Nobody wants to be blamed for failure. They don’t want to be seen as the dog in the manger.”The likeliest conclusion appears to be that different industrialised countries will pledge themselves to their own, differing, legally-binding targets for cutting emissions. That is less than the European Union wants – it has been pressing for a general cut of 15 per cent by the year 2010. But, as it has already agreed to let its own members achieve different targets within an overall EU reduction, it has effectively conceded the point.Some Third World countries are already suggesting they will voluntarily commit themselves to limiting their own emissions which may go some way to meeting US demands that they must be brought into the treaty.