During the Kitchen Week reveals on The Block, a massive $100,000 prize was on the line as the teams not only had to present their kitchens but also a butler’s pantry, a powder room, and a lift.
In the end, Adam and Jolene took home the win after playing their bonus point gnome, earning themselves the cash prize and a super luxury getaway on a $1.2 million boat on the bay.
However, in the lead-up to the Sunday reveals, the stress that comes with the pointy end of the week resulted in a body corporate gone wrong, and it caused even more share house tension than before.
Since Rick was still struggling with his knee, Tayla called a body corporate to request an extra two hours of work — which would ultimately grant everyone else the additional time.
This resulted in a lot of back and forth as Courtney and Sev expressed that they think Rick should be subbed out rather than extend working hours, and Tayla retaliated with cheating allegations.
In response, Jolene called Tayla a “brat”, Chantel and Wyatt said they’d rather just get more sleep than work, and Lisa and Rosco questioned why it seemed no one wanted the extra time.
In the end, the motion was denied, and a disappointed Lisa pointed out that Courtney and Sev wouldn’t have won the $250,000 kitchen upgrade in Week 2 without everyone else’s help.
“They were not going to finish, there was no way they were going to finish,” she recalled. “A lot of people banded together to get them across the line and get them finished.
“Had they not had that extra support, then there is no doubt that they wouldn’t have been able to win.”
It’s yet another time that the women have been accused of being ahead because of extra help, and Courtney and Sev spoke to WHO about the accusations, denying the “narrative that [they] can’t finish without the help”.
Courtney and Sev said everyone was getting help
When Tayla received a styling tutorial from host Shelley, Courtney and Sev told WHO that it “didn’t bother [them] in the slightest”, and that they thought “it was actually really cute”.
That’s why it’s been “hurtful” for Courtney and Sev to see how much fans and contestants have been grumbling about the help they’ve received here throughout the show, especially given how much everyone has helped each other out this season.
“It is unfortunate that we are getting the narrative that we can’t finish without help from the boys,” Courtney and Sev said. “But the truth is that they were helping everyone.”
Courtney also described how she helped organise and pick up the gyprock for all the contestants this week after CSR reported that it would be delayed.
“We are getting backlash, but every single contestant is getting help every single day from Nine in Six and Scotty and Shelley,” she said. “They aren’t just favouring us. That’s just what’s being shown.
“It’s really hurtful and upsetting to Sev and I.”
‘Why are [viewers] so fixated on us?’
As the season has gone on, Courtney and Sev admitted that they can’t help but “be curious if people are actually clocking [that other people are getting help too] or if there’s just such a fixation on us”.
“It’s just so easy just to name and tag us as the girls getting help,” they said. “And that’s just become one solid narrative.”
“It literally gets pushed across every single house, and sometimes there’s more context behind it, and sometimes it’s not being captured, but for some reason, we are living rent-free in a lot of people’s heads.”
Sev added: “Part of us, we love the idea that any PR is good PR, but then we’re like, ‘We don’t understand why you’re so fixated on us’. It’s just nuts.
“If we asked to borrow someone’s trades or to use someone’s trades, we would be getting absolutely slammed right now online.
“But we have shared around our trades multiple times. There were no call-outs last night [Monday, September 14] about us giving House Five our plasterers, which actually ends up hurting us quite a bit in the long run.”
Sev also pointed out that Courtney “always helped everybody” throughout the season, as “she comes from a background of what goes around comes around”, despite it not being shown on screen.
“But that part of it is just not being recognised,” Sev said. “And that’s a little bit unfortunate.”
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