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Osborne has announced £12bn in cuts to welfare. It's hitting young people incredibly hard. On top of all of that, public sector wages have been capped at 1% rise. This isn't an acceptable situation. We know tens of billions are lost every year in tax avoidance."

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The Chancellor has not even promised to meet the current living wage of £7.85 and under-25s will face the brunt of cuts but receive no increase in wages. The Chancellor is cutting from the poor whilst paying out to the rich, he is short changing those on low incomes whilst giving tax breaks to the better off. The reality is that in delivering his emergency Budget the Chancellor has simply exacerbated the emergency situation faced by many on low pay and low incomes."

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Number 10 is cockahoop with its living wage announcement and sources say this was something the Chancellor has been looking at for a couple of years but felt he couldn't go for without big cuts to the welfare bill, and those were blocked within the last parliament by the Lib Dems. Free of those shackles, he was able to go for the two step - cuts to welfare, and an increase in the living wage.

Allegra Stratton, Newsnight political editor

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What's a bit disappointing is that he doesn't really have anything that looks like a strategy for a significant change to the tax system. We don't have anything laid out here which tells me that at the end of this parliament we will have a more sensible tax system than we had at the beginning of it."

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We need to see much more done, in particular around productivity. The ridiculous situation right now where people in our country who are doing amongst the longest hours in western Europe but their output is less than an average worker in the G7 - and that's because, frankly, they're not being given the tools to do the trade."

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The Budget has a lot to digest within it, but one morsel worth chewing over is the section on universities. The government has replaced grants with maintenance loans. But the document may also mark an important intellectual shift in the way that we run our higher education system, as it will introduce a rather radical idea - different universities deserve very different treatment."

Chris Cook, Newsnight Policy Editor

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We recognise the current system needs to be reformed and highlighted this in a recent report. The chancellor's Budget announcement on the regime came as a surprise and is of considerable concern. The introduction of a surcharge on premium cars also risks undermining growth in UK manufacturing and exports. British-built premium cars are in increasing demand at home and globally, and the industry helps to support almost 800,000 jobs in the UK. Levelling a punitive tax on these vehicles will almost certainly impact domestic demand."

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The suggestion that higher tax allowances will offset tax credit cuts is sheer fallacy: 44% of adults earn too little to pay income tax and those on slightly higher wages gain little because tax credits are withdrawn as incomes rise. The impact will be dramatic: as Supreme Court judges have noted, the current cap deprives children of the basic necessities of life, in breach of international law."

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Tax credit cuts could blow a £1,200 hole in some families budgets, leaving them struggling to cover even the cost of basics such as school uniforms for their children. Children who grow up poor are more likely to be ill, do worse at school and be jobless in future."

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Many believe that come 2018 there will be a straight fight for who will become Conservative leader and de facto prime minister - between George Osborne and Boris Johnson. Bo Jo has gone hard on the London living wage... One Tory MP tells me that the surprise living wage announcement has helped Osborne neuter one of Boris’ key USPs.

James Clayton, Newsnight Political producer

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For all its talk about striving, aspiration and creating a Northern Powerhouse, this Budget has delivered none of it. It shows that the Conservatives, devoid of fresh ideas, have simply rehashed old ones that were rejected over the last few years."

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A two-child family with one full-time earner on the minimum wage will receive £1,612 less in tax credits under the new system. The big question is: will the wage increases under the new living wage be enough to offset these cuts? The new £7.20 Living Wage will increase gross income by nearly £1,300 for the same family with a full-time earner, but the difficulty is that increases in gross income are offset by payments in national insurance and income tax, and decreases tax credits. This will mean that the family’s net income will not increase by nearly as much - by only around £255, for those not claiming housing benefit."