Doctors will have to boycott “gagging” clauses in agreements with employers or contracting bodies that try to stop them raising concerns about patients’ safety or poor quality care, under new guidance from the General Medical Council.

Mirror guidance for doctors in management roles will put them under a corresponding duty not to propose or condone contracts or agreements containing such clauses.

Gagging clauses still appear, despite NHS guidance as far back as 1999 that all trusts should “prohibit confidentiality ‘gagging’ clauses in contracts of employment and compromise agreements which seek to prevent the …