Business Diary: The CBI has its own payroll problem

The CBI's call yesterday for a public sector pay freeze might have gone down better with the trade unions if the employers' organisation's own executives were not quite so well paid. Richard Lambert, the CBI's director general, received "emoluments" worth £326,000 last year according to the group's annual report – that's roughly £100,000 more than the Prime Minister was paid. John Cridland, his number two, earned more than £200,000. Both men got pay rises worth around 2 per cent.

Newcastle BS repositions staff on to the dole

There was a time when you could depend on building societies to eschew the nonsense business jargon so often beloved of their larger banking rivals – and one always felt this was part of why, by and large, the sector suffered less during the financial crisis. Brickbats then for Newcastle Building Society, which has come up with a novel way of describing cost cuts that will result in more than 120 staff losing their jobs and the remainder having their pension benefits docked. This, apparently, is a "Repositioning Programme".

Read our blogs to find cheaper medicines

Red faces at The Telegraph Group: its website has been hijacked by a Canadian pharmaceutical company hoping to sell its cut-price drugs. The newspaper's My Telegraph site, which is home to the blogs of Daily and Sunday Telegraph readers, has been taken over by Canadian Pharmacy, with all of the featured blogs linking to adverts for its products.

Butlins proves that Britain's got talent

Congratulations to Butlins. The holiday camp company, more used to hosting talent contests, has finally won one itself. It is to be Britain's representative in HSBC Bank's European Business Awards. Its Eurovision moment, should you want to cheer Butlins on, comes at a continent-wide showdown to be held in Paris in November.

businessdiary@independent.co.uk