Local authorities have been asked to suspend plans to close rural schools.

Education Secretary Mike Russell has written to Scotland's councils asking them not to continue with or bring forward new proposals for closures until June 2012.

He announced a new commission to look at education provision in rural communities and how current legislation deals with plans to shut schools.

Mr Russell said: "The delivery of education in rural communities is about much more than a school building, it is fundamental to the social and economic make-up of a community.

"That is why it is the right of individual communities to have genuine consultation based on accurate information and why there is, and will remain, a clear legislative presumption against closure.

"To allow for a comprehensive and fair assessment of the closures process, I have asked for a one-year moratorium during which local authorities will not propose rural schools for closure.

"During this period a new commission on the delivery of rural education will be tasked with, amongst other things, reviewing the legislation and its application and making recommendations on best practice on the delivery of education in rural areas.

"It will also look at innovation and the link between rural education and rural regeneration."

Mr Russell said he will give more details about the commission shortly but said it will have licence to "think radically", returning at the start of the next year with proposals.

In January, Mr Russell was accused of interfering in one council's school closures programme. The senior SNP minister told Holyrood he had acted "with propriety" throughout the process in Argyll and Bute.

Mr Russell was reported to the standards watchdog when an email was leaked from his parliamentary account, which showed he had questioned local SNP councillors about their support for several school closures in the area.

He told MSPs he had made clear his role as Education Secretary and only spoke to local parents and interested groups as a parliamentary candidate.