Jump racing is richer, healthier and more popular than ever. The recent Cheltenham Festival conquered freakish weather to crown compelling new champions. Colourful storylines are drawing a significant new audience. But one lingering cloud could dramatically darken the horizons for this sport.

The racing community inclines to insularity. For years it has clung doggedly to established practices and conventions, some of which pass no scrutiny by modern society. At present, the most vexatious is the jockeys' use - and misuse - of the whip.

Is it cruel to hit horses to make them run faster? Is the whip a necessary tool of race-riding or merely a prop that should be dispensed with? One thing is certain. Two grim instances of whip abuse have recently sullied the image of racing.

Eddie Ahern, a Flat jockey, was banned for three months for such excesses that some welfare bodies believe the matter should go to court. The suspension, likely to have cost him £50,000 earnings, ends on Thursday. And only last week, Keiran Burke, a young National Hunt rider, was banned for 40 days for a second unedifying infringement.

This week, a handful of leading jump jockeys have also been serving suspensions for whip offences at Cheltenham. None was a case of brutality, but their collective absence has concentrated minds on the need to resolve differences exemplified by a race in which Tony McCoy, the multiple champion, put his stick down before the line having exceeded his quota of strikes on Refinement, the reluctant mare. McCoy lost the race, was banned for excessive use and could, bizarrely, also have been punished for not riding out to the line. He would have won had he been allowed to keep using the stick. In his mind, it made a mockery of the rules.

On Monday at Wincanton, a diverse group of riders and administrators will convene for what can soberly be called a crisis meeting. Josh Apiafi, the chief executive of the Professional Jockeys' Association, will take along two senior jump riders and Kevin Darley, the recently retired former Flat champion. The British Horseracing Authority (BHA) and its stewards will be well represented. The RSPCA, whose staunch support for racing is wavering on this issue, will be briefed on the outcome.

“We all admit that things are not working,” Apiafi said. “The available punishments are not acting as a deterrent. Horses are not getting beaten up, but the public perception is poor. We need to get the correct people in that room and lock the door on them if we need to. In the past, regulations have been imposed without consultation with the sportsmen who have to put them into practice. This is a chance for the jockeys to buy into the process.”

Paul Struthers, the communications officer for the BHA, said: “Things cannot stay as they are, so we are starting with a blank sheet of paper. Racing needs to get on top of this problem before other people start trying to do it for us.”

A wide variety of proposals and ideas will be discussed, including disqualifying horses whose riders have badly overstepped the mark and banning the whip after the final obstacle in jumps races. Longer bans are possible, but the jockeys will emphasise the need for clarity.

Aintree's three-day Grand National fixture starts on Thursday. The common dread is that it could be undermined by the whip issue - by stewards scattering bans, by jockeys and trainers protesting innocence, worst of all by animal rights campaigners demanding the abolition of racing whips.

This cause, which has been echoed in Parliament, raises hackles and alarms. Some of jump racing's most rational minds see it as the thin end of the wedge, the start of a gradual erosion that could lead to extremists persuading higher forces that the sport is cruel. As Aintree is an appealing landscape for such militant expression, the urgency of Monday's meeting is still greater.

Its conclusions, though, will need to be heeded, which was self-evidently not the case after a comparable meeting on the first morning of Cheltenham. David Muir, the RSPCA's racing consultant, recalls a 90-minute debate in the stewards' room, centring on the whip. The jockeys were then briefed on what was expected and what was unacceptable. Nine bans resulted.

Muir acknowledges the special pressures at such championship meetings and believes that the jumps riders use the whip more responsibly than their colleagues on the Flat. “There has been an unacceptable increase of infringements on the Flat and that has to be curtailed,” he said.

For now, the focus remains on jumping, where long and tiring races on soft ground can make whip use look unpalatable. On the last evening at Cheltenham, a frustrated William Nunneley, the senior stipendiary steward, said: “They are not listening to us. They need to know that unless they do, this whole matter could be taken out of our hands.” Nunneley, however, emphasised that what happened at Cheltenham was not a veterinary issue. “No horses were marked or harmed in any way,” he said. “But the jockeys all broke the guidelines and that is unfortunate. It is the public image of the sport that is at stake.”

It is this that infuriates some jockeys. They believe that they are being judged unfairly by those innocent of new whip designs and of the conservative way in which most jockeys use them. They also resent what some regard as the pot-stirring of television presenters, effectively in drawing the attention of stewards and public to possible whip offences. However, Struthers said: “They may be right that they are judged on perception by the wider public, but they are not punished on perception. The rules are there in black and white.”

It is those rules and guidelines that will be revisited on Monday, primarily to allow for clearer understanding and more consistent stewarding but also because outside forces demand it. A storm is brewing.

Festival miscreants

A number of high-profile jockeys fell foul of the whip rules at the Cheltenham Festival this month

Robert Thornton Four-day ban for using whip with excessive frequency on Katchit and three days for hitting Captain Cee Bee in wrong place

Tony McCoy Four-day ban for using whip with excessive frequency and in wrong place on Refinement

Ruby Walsh Five-day ban for using whip with excessive frequency and in wrong place on Fiveforthree and a day for excessive frequency on Kicks For Free

Tom Scudamore Two days for using whip with excessive frequency on Osana

Jockey's view

Robert Thornton, one of Britain's outstanding jump jockeys, achieved two trebles at the Cheltenham Festival this month - he rode three winners and was called before the stewards three times for infringing the whip rules. This week he has been serving two suspensions, one of which he regards as unfair, and reflecting on the issue from the ski slopes of Les Arcs in France. He says:

Since Cheltenham finished, I've sat and watched every single race again. My conclusion is that the stewards could have done several others for offences that were no different to mine, but they couldn't do so without making a mockery of the whole meeting.

On Tuesday [the first day of the meeting] there was a queue outside the stewards' room. It was crazy. They banned so many people that they couldn't carry on and things quietened down until there was another rush of bans on the last day.

Some were merited. My first one was for hitting a horse in the wrong place and I have no argument with that - the rule is clear and I broke it. But I do have an issue with the four days I got for frequency. It was in the Champion Hurdle on Katchit and he wouldn't have won without it. There was no brutality, no abuse and the horse was not marked.

If the stewards had cautioned me rather than issuing a ban, it would not have drawn such attention to it because I honestly think it was no different to the way I rode several other horses.

Later in the week they cautioned me for my ride on Group Captain and I was half-expecting to get more days because I hit him just as often as Katchit. Then, when I won on Nenuphar Collonges, who is a lazy horse, I was at him all the way round, but the stewards did nothing.

It is consistency that we're seeking. We want the rules to be clearer so that we know where we stand. And I also don't think it is right that jockeys are punished because of concerns over public perception, rather than the modern reality. When I go out at Aintree next week, I'll have enough to worry about without that.

With the whips that we have now, which are light and cushioned, it would be very hard to hurt a horse. So the issue is whether using the whip at all is cruel or not and I firmly believe it's not.

I understand that the stewards and authorities are under pressure from outside forces, but it's sad they are beholden to people who don't understand racing. It's another sign of our wishy-washy society and it drives me insane.

Welfare view

David Muir has been racing consultant to the RSPCA for ten years and has spent much of that time dampening down the paranoias of animal welfare militants. Unlike them, he is not instinctively against racing and he was largely responsible for the creation of the modern cushioned whip. Although he is not a whip abolitionist, he knows plenty who are and at Cheltenham this month his concerns over the deepening controversy were heightened. He says:

Cheltenham is unique - a championship event with an uphill finish on which horses get tired. Sometimes it can look worse than it is. It is difficult for jockeys at the biggest meetings, but they must realise they have a duty of care. The new Animal Welfare Bill puts that duty on both the corporate body and the jockeys.

In my view, it is only fair that a jockey should be able to bring a horse to attention. They are pack animals and during a race they can revert to herd instincts and get distracted. Using a whip to make them concentrate is acceptable.

The new whip has been generally accepted now, especially by the National Hunt jockeys. The old one, which was a nylon rod with a leather thong on the end, could inflict unnecessary levels of pain; this one does not. But what still causes me a problem is excessive force or frequency and the rules need to be more specific and probably stricter. In jump races, I wonder if we could say you can't use the whip after the last obstacle. We'd still have a first, second and third in every race, but they would have to be ridden home with hands and heels.

The best laws are always those that seek prevention. Wealing a horse by hitting it too hard is the biggest issue and should be punished in the same way as a jockey who loses a race by dropping his hands. As things stand, one gets 28 days and the other may get no more than four. There are occasions when horses are marked for no apparent reason - it can happen if they have recently been clipped, for instance. We don't want unfairness to any jockey, so where there is any doubt, further investigation should take place.

Aintree next week is sure to put the focus on the whip again and the jockeys must be aware that the pressure is mounting. My own body feels the need for final resolution or it might change its stance.

In all my conversations over the past ten years, this is the highest-profile issue and it's not going away. The whip puts an awful lot of people off racing and I believe there is now a general feeling that something has to be done.