Radio station Bath FM has a new owner - its fifth in less than two years.

Live broadcasting at the troubled station and its four sister outlets ended last night and today an emergency back-up system was playing music and identity jingles on a loop.

The station has now been bought by Cheltenham-based TotalStar, which says it wants Bath FM and the other four stations back on air next week.

The firm which runs an independent station covering the Gloucestershire town has already begun rehiring sales staff from the closed-down outlets.

Bath FM, Brunel FM in Swindon, 3TR in Warminster and the QuayWest FM stations in Bridgwater and Watchet - all of which were owned by the Your Media Communications Group - stopped active broadcasting at 5pm yesterday.

YMCG has gone into administration, and the firm’s administrators - Plymouth insolvency practice Neville and Co - sent a representative to each station to pull the plug.

All the staff were made redundant and equipment was today being removed from Bath FM’s studios at Weston.

TotalStar managing director Brett Orchard said he wanted to get the stations back on air “early next week”.

His station employs former Radio 1 presenter Mike Read as its mid-morning presenter and Mr Orchard said that to begin with, the five stations would be broadcasting networked programmes.

He said his firm was in touch with regulator Ofcom over the transfer of the licences.

Mr Orchard said the future of the stations was “incredibly secure and incredibly positive.”

“The reason we’ve taken them on is we’re confident we can make them work.”

The stations have had a chequered history in recent years, with the collapse of one owner, Laser Broadcasting, in October 2008, followed by that of South West Radio last August.

YMCG bought all the stations in August, but had been consistently refused permission by regulator Ofcom to take control of the all-important licences.

These continue to be held by Exeter accountancy firm Kirk Hills, the administrator of South West Radio.

YMCG director Nigel Reeve - who was chief executive of Laser and a consultant to South West Radio - had consistently promised that a new investor was on the horizon, whose cash would overcome Ofcom’s concerns over the financial stability of the stations.

There had also been talk of a move from Bath FM’s existing studios in Station Road to offices at Bath City’s Twerton Park ground, but this never materialised.

Among the casualties of the station shutdown is Peter Smith, who was appointed news and sports editor at Bath FM on February 22 - meaning his career in the post lasted just a month and two days.

He said he and other staff had been let down by YMCG.

“My brief was to restart local news from the city. Previously everything had come from Swindon.

“I was making waves, re-establishing a good relationship and coverage of news events, getting about in the city, and livening up our local news coverage, busting a gut to convince Ofcom to give us the licence back.”

He had hosted a Saturday sports show since March last year, and added: “I am proud of what I've done to pick Bath FM up from where it was down. If you talk to local sport people, including at the university, my reputation is excellent.

“Good people working here and elsewhere in the group - some, including myself, recently brought in, doing their best to wipe out the past and rebuild its reputation - have been badly let down by owners YMCG who kept telling us money was there when it wasn't.

“So have advertisers who put their money up for a product we were beginning to deliver at last, and now cannot.”

Neither Nevilles nor Mr Reeve wanted to comment today, and David Kirk of Kirk Hills was unavailable for comment.

Bath MP Don Foster said: “I am very keen to ensure the continuity under a new ownership of this vital community service.”

He had been in talks with Bath and North East Somerset Council over the possibility of establishing a community radio station if no commercial operator had emerged.

Former Bath FM breakfast show presenter Ian Dore, who helped increase the station’s audience by 76 per cent in one year in 2007, said it had been reduced to “a shocking pantomime.”

He returned to the studios today in a vain bid to reclaim an old bike which he had left there.

“As I walked into Bath FM for the first time in 14 months, it was akin to walking around the Titanic. Once full of fun, laughter and pride, over the recent months it’s been reduced to a sad, dirty, rotting shell of a station.”

He acknowledged that TotalStar’s track record was a good one but said he feared for the future of local content.

Bath FM’s licence runs out next year and will be put up for grabs again this September by Ofcom.

Mr Dore said: “The Bath FM licence is open for anyone to apply for in September. My point being if the people of Bath aren’t happy with what they get in the next few months, they actually have an opportunity to change it.”

He said he would always be proud of what he and his former colleagues had achieved.

“I left the building with a sense of pride with what the old team had achieved. I also left with the ‘ejector seat’ button that was mounted on the broadcasting desk in Studio A and a huge smile on my face. You can take the station, you can lose my bike. But you can’t take the fun, the memories and the original spirit of Bath FM. That will remain, always.”