David Orr, chief executive, National Housing Federation

"We welcome the Chancellor's focus on housing and the announcement of a new garden city, but we think the Budget is a missed opportunity. Measures like Help to Buy are likely to stimulate demand for housing but the Budget does not go far enough to boost the supply of homes needed to meet that demand.

The Chancellor says the 23% increase in house building is not enough and we agree with him. An effective release of public land for house building, increasing the borrowing capacity of housing associations and extending Government guarantees to back financing for new development, would all have made a significant and immediate boost to the supply of affordable homes.

We welcome the announcement of the new garden city in Ebbsfleet, but it will only make a difference if it is the first of many. The new homes in Ebbsfleet must not merely replace homes that would have been built elsewhere."

Grainia Long, chief executive, Chartered Institute of Housing

"Following the credit crunch small builders have found it more difficult to access finance, so the government's announcement of £500m to help them get building is welcome."

Simon, Rubinsohn, chief economist, RICS

"While plans for regeneration and new homes in Barking, Brent Cross and the new garden 'city' at Ebbsfleet - which is really just a garden village - will contribute a little housing in the South East. These numbers are a drop in the ocean and do nothing to help others in the UK. More importantly, they don’t deliver the mix of homes we need across society, from the private rented sector to affordable and social housing.

RICS has long called for an investors' prospectus for garden cities, which we welcome today. But we need a more ambitious approach than 15,000 homes at a time. To provide investors, communities and developers with greater confidence, what we need is a proper political vision for garden cities and the wider economy."

David Sheridan, chief executive, Keepmoat

"The extension of Help to Buy will give the house building industry more confidence to plan ahead for the next six years so we can now begin to think about hiring more staff to build more homes and investing in apprentices. As a result, we are looking to increase our number of apprentices by 50%, by employing at least another 100 apprentices over the next 12 months."

Anna Scott-Marshall, head of external affairs, RIBA

"We welcome the Government's announcement to take forward our policy on allocating land for self and custom build homes through the Right to Build programme and the promise that the government will finally publish its long promised prospectus on garden cities.

However, changes to Help to Buy to deliver 120,000 homes by 2020 and the introduction of the Builders' Finance Fund will fall short of providing the boost to housing supply we desperately need. The Government needs to stop tinkering around the edges of the housing crisis and start taking serious steps towards solving it."

Julia Evans, chief executive, National Federation of Builders (NFB)

"The NFB welcomes recognition of the contribution of smaller builders with the creation of the £500 million Builders Finance Fund. However, it was disappointing not to hear any announcements on boosting retrofit measures, which would have helped people to improve their homes and bring down energy bills. The Chancellor should not only fix the roof while sun is shining but should have made sure it is insulated by providing additional support through a VAT cut on retrofit measures from 20% to 5%."

Brian Berry, chief executive, Federation for Master Builders

"The Chancellor's Budget announcement of a £500m Builders Finance Fund for small house builders will provide a major boost for housing supply. Unfortunately today's Budget overlooks the need to make our existing homes an infrastructure investment priority. A reduction in VAT to 5% on housing renovation and repair is the simplest and most effective way to empower home owners to refurbish their properties to make them more energy efficient and cheaper to run. This cut in VAT would provide a £15bn economic stimulus over five years and up to 95,000 jobs which are much needed while our economy is still in recovery."

Mike Quinton, chief executive, NHBC

"We welcome today's announcement which places the house building industry at the heart of the Budget. Although our statistics show that new home registration numbers went up by 28% in 2013 compared to the previous year, it is vital to recognise that the recovery is from a low base and numbers remain well below pre-recession levels.

Help to Buy has given the UK house building industry a shot in the arm. The extension now provides much-needed certainty and confidence for it to plan for the future. The Chancellor's announcement to extend the Help to Buy scheme, which has already given the sector a welcome boost, until the end of the decade will give tens of thousands of people the opportunity to own their brand new home."

Steve Bromhead, head of UK infrastructure, industry and utilities, EC Harris

"Today's Budget was, as feared, a damp squib. It's been clear for some time that we need to turn the National Infrastructure Plan into a long term integrated plan. What is becoming clearer is the need to turn this plan into action and to integrate infrastructure policy. We must get these initiatives off the ground and ensure the investment, regulation and other enablers are put in place by the government to allow this.

In response to flooding investment, whilst that investment is welcome, it only deals with short-term recovery, and we are surprised that there has been no reference to long-term flood prevention."

David Tonkin, chief executive for UK and Europe, Atkins

"The budget announcements around new housing and infrastructure projects such as the new garden city at Ebbsfleet, continued support of HS2 and the £270 million guarantee for Mersey Gateway bridge, are not only great examples of investments which will improve people's lives now and in the future, they send a clear message to investors that the UK is a great place to invest and do business. It is vital that the funding is released quickly and that planning processes do not unnecessarily slow down the delivery of these projects, so the economic and social benefits they will bring can be realised as soon as possible."

Andy Wheeler, head of energy and utilities, Aecom

"£140m to repair flood defences is good, but that will only put us back to where we were before the floods. We need new measures to protect life and property when it rains."

Duncan Symonds, head of infrastructure, WSP

"The £200m for potholes is a knee jerk reaction, and while welcome because there are urgent repairs needed due to the flooding, if there was better long-term funding we could potentially avoid the problem in the first place. The road repairs backlog already stands at £10.5 billion and to avoid it getting worse local authorities need funding to undertake regular resurfacing which will save money in the long-run."

Stephen Ratcliffe, director, UK Contractors Group

"The good news is that better than expected economic recovery will start to drive private sector investment in infrastructure...

Tax incentives to encourage our supply chain to take on more apprentices will support the work UKCG is doing to ensure the industry has a well trained workforce.

...There will also be some frustration that there were no 'carrots' to stimulate greener construction."

John Alker, director of policy and communications, UK Green Building Council

"Any real hope that the Chancellor is committed to the green agenda faded long ago but what remains deeply disappointing is that he doesn't recognise a growth opportunity when he sees one. There continues to be a complete blind spot on the role that energy efficiency has to play in reducing consumer bills over the long-term, and generating home-grown jobs."