I have had to correct virginblue statements before concerning schedule changes. Look through the terms and conditions of your flight and I bet you will find wording saying that your booking does not form part of a contract. This is standard with airlines to get them out of such things and I know that the company I work for also have this in the small print.
Well, if things worked out like this in the real world, we would not need contract law at all because everybody would just dream up his "small print" and say "err, sorry, but it is in our small print".
Airlines have been taken to court over their "small print" again and again. They simply write silly stuff in their small print because people like you believe if it is in the small print it must be true and according to the law. As a matter of fact, an airline is just a party to a contract and bound by the same principles of contract law as the milkman just around the corner. As most of this stuff nowadays is governed by EU law, it cannot be much different in the UK than in the civil law systems which I am, admittedly, more familiar with (anyway, there are standard principles of contract law).
Random recent examples of airline "small print" that have made judges laugh and led to the "small print" getting trashed in court:
- if you buy a return ticket, you must use the first leg or the return will be cancelled
- if you do not fly, you do not get back your taxes
- if your online payment is not honoured by your bank, you have to pay a 50 EUR fine
- if you miss your flight because we are delayed, we will not pay damages
- we are not responsible for technical faults
- we can change flight times as we please