Picketers outside a controversial inquest have accused Spelthorne Borough Council of "covering up" the reality of a seven-year-old’s death.

Friends and family who make up the Truth About Zane campaign group held a demonstration outside Woking Coroner’s Court before a pre-inquest into the death of Zane Gbangbola on Monday, October 5.

Zane, seven, a former pupil at St George’s Junior School in Weybridge, suffered a cardiac arrest at his home in Chertsey after floodwaters entered his family’s home on February 8, 2014.

His family have maintained that poisonous gases from a former landfill site contaminated the floodwaters, causing their son’s death.

Debbie Fothergill, one of the picketers outside the court whose daughter went to school with Zane, said: "We're here to support the family, we believe that we still need answers for Zane.

"We know at the last pre-inquest that the only toxic material that was found in that house the night he died was hydrogen cyanide gas and we know that they live within metres of a former unregulated landfill site.

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"We also know that the authorities are trying to say that it was carbon monoxide that killed him, but at the last pre-inquest it was revealed that there only 8 per cent carbon monoxide in his blood and we've actually got more in our bloodstreams stood by this road right now. You need in excess of 50 per cent to die from carbon monoxide."

"We believe the authorities are actually trying to cover up the reality of how he died.

"We know that land so far hasn’t been tested and we believe this is a tragedy. Now the rains are starting to come again, that could happen again. It’s probably something they never felt would happen, and it has happened. Nothing has happened since in terms of making that land safe from that toxic chemical. It could get into somebody else’s home."

A spokeswoman from Spelthorne Council denied any wrongdoing on their part.

She said: "Whilst we have the utmost sympathy for the family’s ongoing anguish, we have always maintained that there is no evidence of a link between the landfill and this tragedy, or of a public health risk.

"We hope that the inquest scheduled for January 2016 will provide the family with the answers they have been rightly seeking about the cause of their son’s death."