"Emergency Dept. waiting times"

My daughter injured her ankle at a recent festival but it was not so bad she needed to attend ED but she needed to have an X-Ray, as she had previously damaged and had surgery on her ankle. We tried to go via our GP surgery to be reviewed and hopefully have an a X-Ray ordered this way, rather than having to impact on the waiting  times in ED.

We were advised by our GP reception staff, that there was a 3 week wait for an acute X-Ray and longer still for non-urgent. I fully appreciate that Covid is impacting on services but with many messages coming out to avoid going to ED and use other services, ie. NHS 111, GP etc. why are we being advised to go to ED for non-urgent care intervention?

It is no wonder ED is so busy when GP's etc are just telling people to go to ED! She was seen and waited about 4 hours in total and she did receive excellent care from the ED staff, so this is not a complaint about ED at all but surely there is a way to reduce X-Ray waiting times from GP referrals, to improve the way patients are signposted, so that the emergency/urgent care facilities can be impacted less, for non-emergency care.