http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/business/
SEPT-ÎLES, Que. — For some, it’s a way to make some fast cash. For others, it’s a chance to latch on to an engineer for maybe more than one night.
The “world’s oldest profession” has always found a niche in proximity to large-scale projects that require thousands of workers — where men are alone, isolated from their families and earning a big salary. It’s no different along Quebec’s North Shore, with the advent of Plan Nord, a provincially funded strategy to develop natural resources in northern Quebec, mostly in the mining and energy sectors. Launched in 2011 by former Quebec Premier Jean Charest, it’s targeted at getting major corporations to invest big bucks in an area three times the size of France.
And prostitutes are hoping to take advantage of a resource boom, using classified ads and dating sites to offer their services.
One online ad is from a woman we’ll call “Claudie.” Looking to attract North Shore guys, her piercing eyes promise them seventh heaven. Oral sex is $40 and sex is $100 an hour, and she will provide a receipt if the client chooses to get a massage.
Claudie, who leaves Saguenay by car, will pick up a client on the way near highway 138. Those who want to can meet her at the destination, a motel in Baie-Comeau. She likes her work and told The Huffington Post Québec that it was a job like any other.
Increased mining activity and an influx of temporary workers attracts girls working solo like Claudie, who prefer to drive or take the plane and then shut themselves in a motel room for several days, enough time to make a heap of cash.
A North Shore women’s association hears this type of story on a regular basis. “There are girls, often very young, who run away or disappear to make some money,” communications co-ordinator Marilène Gill said.
“Prostitution is taboo. We don’t see it. There are people who say it is there, others who turn a blind eye, and still others who simply don’t know. But I don’t have any proof,” adds Michèle Audette, who was president of the Native Women’s Association of Canada at the time of the interview. She is now seeking to run for the Liberals in the next election.
At the famous Fer-thèque, the only strip club in the North Shore region, you are as likely to meet city councillors having a drink as temporary workers who’ve come to get an eyeful. A fresh group of girls arrives every Wednesday by bus.
“The bar is doing well and the girls go there in hopes of latching on to an engineer. It becomes almost a way out. It’s almost a casting agency, booking girls,” says Louise Dubreuil, whose office co-ordinates sexual health outreach on behalf of the local health department.
ArcelorMittal employees are known as big spenders at the strip club, often up to $1,000 in a single night, sources told HuffPost Québec.
Prostitution goes unmentioned in Fermont, a small town of nearly 2,900, just like everywhere else in the North Shore region.
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